Doc McStuffin Themed Birthday Party

Our foster daughter of six months was turning 5 years old and loved the cartoon show Doc McStuffins! She was about to leave our home with her brother and we were so glad we could celebrate with her before she left! I had a lot of fun putting this together for her. I hope you enjoy and get some great inspiration! 

Our very happy birthday girl! She moved into our home right before we celebrated two of our kiddos birthday parties and was very much looking forward to her own party. She wanted to dress up and had such a good time! Oh I miss her so. 

All of our Doc McStuffin's themed food! 

Frozen Birthday Party!

My daughter turned 6 this month and for once we had a perfect theme for her December birthday!

I was able to find a ton of snowflake decor on sale right before Christmas. :)

First let me introduce you to my favorite part...the cake! My sweet girl looked around online with me for inspiration and we both had high hopes for her cake. I was excited and nervous to try to pull some ideas together and I have to say I am pretty excited about our creation.

Our cakes are always gluten-free of course. I used a 9x13 pan for the bottom layer and I did a vanilla cake. The gluten-free vanilla mixes I use are usually more dry and I figured it would hold the weight better.

The top around double layer was chocolate. The towers are made of three gluten-free ice cream cones. I covered them with white chocolate melts and a bit of oil to thin it out. They worked great and hardened overnight.

Christmas Cookies!

We have had a bit of a slow start with all of our Christmas fun this year. So I was really excited to kick off our vacation with our first ever, Christmas cookie decorating party!

Enjoy the pictures!

Lets just say, when my husband saw this, he thought I was a little nuts. :) I wanted everyone to have their own set of toppings. Plus for the kids, it was great, because, unlike the fistfuls they could grab in a shared bowl, they could only grab a little pinch at a time. There were 19 of us and I made 20 cups total. Never hurts to have a back up. :) I may have been a little excited about the options. :)

We moved furniture around and set up the table. My favorite part. :) 

Adoption Celebration & Circus Party!

What a weekend it has been! On Friday we had our adoption finalization hearing. What a fun day! We celebrated with family and had cupcakes and apple cider and took a ton of pictures. We took a wonderful family photo with the judge. 

I have spent the last four and half years going in that court room and spent most of those years imagining our adoption ceremony in there. But when I walked in and set up with the kids in the front, sitting at the table, all I could think about was the fact that their birth parents sat in those very same chairs years ago when I sat in the back. I recounted a handful of hard court hearings and all of the waiting and ups and downs in the case. At times, I doubted we would ever get to this day. 

It worked out that my husband was off that day, as were the kids. So we woke up and everyone crawled into our bed and we took our time starting the day. We sang "Happy Adoption Day to you!"

As we made our way downstairs I began picking outfits to wear and getting everything together. 

Along with the pictures and cupcakes to celebrate I brought to the court house, two books. One for each child being adopted. We did this with my other son a few years ago at his adoption. We bought children's books on adoption and asked everyone to sign the inside cover and blank pages. It was such a treat to have the judge and counsel and everyone who had spent the last few years working with these kids, sign their books. :) We brought them to the party the next day and put them on our welcome table for everyone to sign as well.

Catering for a Labor Day Campout

Earlier this year I was asked to cook for a campout at the church I grew up in. My parents still attend and this year they were organizing the annual church campout. 

It was an out reach to the community and while it rained most of the weekend, we had a wonderful time. 

Here are some pictures of my food adventures!

I put together these buckets to help people know where to line up for food. I made signs to change out for every meal. The signs had scripture, quotes, thoughts, all about prayer. Unfortunately, it rained after the first breakfast and well, I didn't laminate my signs. :) I was able to use them though for the last meal after church on Sunday, once the sun shined through. :)

These five gallon buckets were easy to put together. Thankfully my dad provided the buckets and filled them with dirt he had on at his house. I got fabric and tied it around them. The signs were stapled into the sticks. The ground was too hard to put the signs into anyway and we were able to move the buckets around as we needed. :)

Ultimately, if the lines were long, I wanted to provide something for them to read and ponder while they waited.