Theme Party Goodies

 We always pick a theme for the kids birthday parties. I really look forward to it each year because it gives me a chance to be creative. Of course, I don't go buy themed napkins and plates......no no, way too easy. I like to serve themed food and make labels for each dish. As far as decorations we just pick our colors and take it from there. My son just turned two this past week and we decided on a Toy Story party. My kids have tons of Toy Story toys, so I planned to use those as decorations. The theme food is one of my favorite things to work on. We just started doing that this summer with my daughter's Muppet party and the little cards really help tie it all together. Rule number one, check your cards while you are at the store that printed them. Most of mine were cut off and by the time I checked it was too late. I thought I would share some pictures to help inspire your next party and I'll share a few recipes in this post as well.
For our theme food we had.










Buzz Lightyear Galactic Alliance Punch                                                  Slinky's Puppy Chow
This is my "go to" punch for all the kids parties.
We don't ever have soda in the house but we
make an exception for birthdays. Depending on
the theme and color scheme I pick my Sherbet
flavor. Then I add frozen fruit, Squirt, and
sometimes some fruit juice. No measurements,
no recipe. It always tastes great. For Buzz's punch
I used lime Sherbet, Squirt, frozen green grapes,
and blueberries.                                                                                                                                                                                            

                                                                                                         Mr Potato Skins 

   Stinky Pete's Wagon Wheels 
Aka fried green tomatoes                                                                                Woody's Cowboy Dip                                                                                                       

                                                       

                                                                            This isn't traditional cowboy dip.

That's just what I decided to call

it.             This is one one of my

favorite, hearty dips to make.  If 

you read the recipe for my 

Kitschy Quesadillas you follow

the directions for roasting the  

veggies and then  boiling them

in the salsa. From there you just

add shredded cheese and  serve.

Critter food with Cowgirl Ranch

                                                                                                                    "Ham" and Cheese Platter

Rex's Carnivore Platter
This was just marinaded chicken
wrapped in bacon and grilled. It was
full at one point.

                                                                                                           

"Pizza Planet"

And one of my favorite items at the party, "Death by Monkey"
cookies.
These were based on the toy barrel of monkeys and were
filled with mini red M&M's

Filled cookies are my new favorite things in the world. I was inspired by this video for how to make "Pinata Cookies" I used the same recipe for the dough. I cut two discs for the ends, and then a dough nut shape for the middle and used frosting to fuse the three cookies together. They came out a bit messy, because I was experimenting with techniques as I was making them but I feel pretty good going from here. The idea of filled cookies is so exciting to me. Candy corn filled pumpkin cookies, doesn't that sound fun?

Then there was the cake. This was another learning process. Next time I will pick a picture with less small detail, but again this is another technique that I am super excited about. The process is easy, no really.
You pick out a page from a coloring book, or print something offline. Place a piece of wax paper over it and make a batch of butter cream frosting. If you usually use my butter cream recipes, add a couple more cups of sugar to it for this project. Write out a list of how many colors you need and separate your frosting in to that many bowls. Now dye your frosting how ever your chose, food dye or concentrate, or any other method you use for frosting. Mix the dye in to each bowl and starting with the outline, trace your picture. *Tip, you may want to put this on a piece of cardboard so that it can be moved around easily once it's done. Next color in all the details. The last step is to color the background colors and fill in the big spaces.

Now let it dry. I put mine in the fridge over night. When you are ready, you simply flip it on top of you cake and there you go. Don't you love Pinterest?











Lat but not least, there were the toys. We had arm men all over the house and our table. We had Mr Potato Head on our mantel and a rescue mission on our window ledge. All in all our Toy Story party was a success and a whole lot of fun. Next year Eve said she is going to want a "Brave" party. That should be fun.