American Indian Playgroup

November is American Indian Heritage Month so I wanted to do something to celebrate. Plus, it would be something new and different for the kids!I found a couple of books that I thought would be fun but also teach something to the kids.I also planned a dream catcher craft for the kids to do. We ended up having a fairly young group though so it turned into a craft for the moms! Oh well, I think they all enjoyed it!
And to top it off, a coloring page to go with the book The Girl Who Loved Wild Horses.

Halloween Banner

I didn't get to do too much for Halloween this year due to a busy schedule and a school party at the same time as playgroup. Boo.The one thing that I did (which hopefully made up for the lack of anything else) was put together a banner for the playgroup party.

I put more work into it than I usually would for a banner, but I plan on using it for several years!

Carnival Playgroup

With winter coming/here, we have to keep playgroup interesting so we don't go crazy from being indoors too much. What better way to spice things up than to take the kids to a carnival?We had a bunch of different stations with activities for the kids to participate in. Pin the nose on the clown was a simple and fun game to start off with!We had a fishing game with bouncy balls for the prize which the kids absolutely loved.I was in charge of a bean bag toss game. The object of the game was to toss bean bags and flip over three popcorn buckets to win a prize!Surprise, surprise, the prize was a bag of popcorn!We also had one mom in charge of balloon animals/other objects!And another mom in charge of face painting!

To finish everything off we had a parade set to some fun carnival music. We asked the kids to dress up in a crazy outfit. Another mom also brought a big tub of dress up clothes to add a little more fun to it!

I wish I could take all the credit for this carnival, but I just helped with my one game. Kim, if you ever read this, you're amazing!

Ribbon Pumpkins

Last year I wanted to do something different with our pumpkins. I decided on ribbons!Splash-of-color ribbon!Sporty ribbon!Spooky ribbon!

Spacy...pumpkin! No ribbon at all but it was 4 year old perfection!

Batman Birthday Card

I made this card for my father-in-law who works a lot of night shifts!

Besides, who doesn't want more sleep??

Mario Galaxy 2 Party Hats

Along with the Mario and Luigi hats we already had, I made some more character hats for the kids to dress up in for my son's Super Mario Galaxy 2 party. I cut out all the patterns with my Cricut, traced them onto felt, cut the pieces out, hot-glued them together and then hot-glued them to the hat.I made a mini Princess Peach hat for my 1 year old daughter so she could join in on the fun!When I made the Mario and Luigi hats I actually sewed the white part onto the hat itself. With Wario and Waluigi I just glued it on and it was just fine.I had to be a little creative with some of the hats. This one is for Diddy Kong. He has stars on his shirt so I just put those on the hat instead.DaisyDry BonesKing Boo - This is one of my favorites for some reason!ToadRosalina! I totally had to make up my own ideas for this. I used a wand (since she has a wand), a "luma", and then I added the light blue tulle to give it a little something extra.

And last, but not least, Bowser! This one is also one of my favorites! The horns are made of two pieces of felt hot-glued together. The flame mohawk is made of flames alternately glued together and then glued to the hat at the bas of the flame. This is the hat my husband wore for the game when all the kids had to defeat Bowser.

Super Mario Galaxy 2 Birthday Party

This year for my son's birthday party, I decided on a Super Mario Galaxy 2 theme (that's quite a mouthful!).For table decorations I made some Piranha Plants. They were really simple, just styrofoam balls, paint, green pipe cleaners, green and white foam, and little wooden spools.I also made some coin and brick blocks. Yes, I drew all the lines on the bricks by hand!I made green and red mushroom cupcakes. The white circles are just Wilton's white chocolate melts.Now for the fun stuff! I made hats for all the kids to wear. I was so excited to make these and I think they turned out great (yes, I am patting myself on the back...)!

For the party games, I chose actual names from the levels in the video game and went from there.The first game was Luigi's Purple Coin Chaos! I found dark chocolate Hershey Kisses, bought 100 of them and scattered them all over the room. The kids had to collect all the "coins" that Luigi dropped.Next, Sneaking Down the Creepy Corridor. I taped some Halloween-esqe decorations in the hallway and on the bedroom door that the game was taking place in. When they opened the door they discovered......a room full of Boos!There was a Comet Medal hidden in the room full of "Boos" and the kids had to find it!Then we played Silver Stars Pop-Up. I put together a scavenger hunt to find the five Silver Stars that were hiding around the house. (Side note - I used Sheriff badges that I found at a party store but then found actual little silver stars the next time I went back! Grr!)


The final level was Bowser's Big Lava Power Party! My husband wore the Bowser hat and the kids were supposed to throw water balloon "fireballs" at him until they defeated Bowser. Unfortunately, it rained and we had to move the party inside so we had to improvise with balled up plastic bags. It worked out fine, none of the kids cared as long as they got to throw something at an adult!I made a poster with outlines of everything the kids needed to collect in each level.

Once they defeated Bowser, the kids were awarded the Grand Star for completing all the levels. It was the sweetest reward they could have gotten!

Fall Nature Walk Playgroup

This week for playgroup, we went on a Fall Nature Walk.I brought bags to collect all the fall "treasures."When we finished the walk we glued all of the treasures to the bag.

The kids had a great time and when my son got home from school and heard about what we did, we had to go on another walk so he could collect his own fall treasures!