2nd Annual Junction Halloween Costume Swap

20 Sep

There’s a chill in the air and the kids are settling back into school, so it must be time to think Halloween right?  Yes, it’s time to tackle the dress up bin and trade out all the old too small costumes for fun new to you, and ones that fit again. Let’s green this Halloween and swap costumes!

Junction Halloween Costume Swap

Kid Culture, Pitter Potter, Diana Nazareth Photography, Green Moms Collective, Children’s Art Theatre School and Play Me Mama present the 2nd Annual Junction Halloween Costume Swap.

The event will be held from 10 a.m. till 6 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 5th at Kid Culture, 3124 Dundas St W Toronto, ON. Costumes and accessories to be swapped can be dropped off at Kid Culture from Sunday September 22nd till Friday October 4th.

How it works: From Sunday September 22nd till Friday October 4th you bring in all the costumes of Halloween’s past that no longer fit, or are no longer wanted at your house to Kid Culture (clean please!). We’ll give you a swap ticket for every costume you bring in and then on Saturday October 5th from 10 am till 6 pm come back and take home some new to you costumes. No costumes from Halloween’s past haunting your house yet, no problem you can buy a costume from the swap stash for a $5.00 donation to The Redwood, a safe haven for Woman and Children fleeing abuse.  Kid Culture carries locally produced costumes in the shop and you’ll want to book a Halloween party with Pitter Potter.

Diana Nazareth Photography will be set up with a Photo Booth, Play Me Mama will have costumes for sale, Green Moms Collective has green info for you to share, and Children’s Art Theatre School is sharing door prizes.

Make sure to visit Green Halloween to see if there is a National Costume Swap Day happening in your area.

 

Pin It

Tags: , , , , , ,

And then she was 6 and wanted a Fairy Party- The Crafts

4 Sep

Ever since we did a craft at Wise Daughters this summer M2 has been informing me that we will have to do crafts at her party!  Crafts are a great idea at a party because it appeals to almost all types of kids.  For her party we decided to break out the wooden cloth pins and make some fairies.   I just set the items out on the table and let the kids have at it.  It sort of was the perfect activity because all the parents had a chance to sit back and chat!

Fairy Craft

the creative table

Fairy Crafts

the creative juices get flowing

Fairy Crafts

another little fairy

Along with the wooden cloths pins (I choose the flat ones so that they would sit on the table for little hands to work with them easier), then some markers, glue, feathers, glitter, assorted flowers and what ever craft supplies that are kicking around that might look could glued onto a character.  The kids got so creative some did not even use the cloths pins they just made a collage with some of the fabric.  It was awesome.  After everyone ate their cookies they took the wands over to the craft table and made even fancier wands.

Such a fun way to end the day.   Well that is it for the fairy party, a great time was had by all and the park we picked provided the perfect area for the kids to just run and play fairy through out the park.  It was fun.

Now apparently next year M2 is planning a mermaid party and it would seem Mama is going to have to figure how to make tails for all the guests…

Cheers,

Jenn

 

 

Pin It

Tags: , , , ,

And then she was 6 and wanted a Fairy Party- Loot Bags

3 Sep

Now I know loot bags are on the outs for an eco-friendly party.  By their very nature, they create waste because not everyone is going to like what you so lovingly picked out to put in the loot bag.  But do you see how I said lovingly put in?  That’s right here we take time to think who is going to be at the party and what they might like and generally attempt to customize.  For the fairy party we did not really customize most of the loot bags, but we did try to individualize them with a combination of homemade items and books that fit the theme.

We supported one of our favourite craft supply shops Ladeebee when we bought the bottles and string for these pixie dust bottle necklaces.

Pixie Dust

a little pixie dust

While reading SouleMama I spotted this fun fairy dust I knew I had to make it!  I got the tins from New Directions and the aloe vera and glycerin at the natural foods shop.  The glitter I picked up at the craft shop, because I noticed that the cosmetic glitter all had aluminum in it and that made me question that a little.

Fairy Dust

a little body glitter

To complete the loot part we put in a book and magnifying glass.

Fairy Literature

some reading material

M2 had asked everyone to dress up on the invitation and they all came in their favourite fairy attire, but just in case we made everyone a stuffed tutu (even the boys!).  I had used this tutuorial from Little Pink Monster before so knew it would be easy enough to whip up some that M2 then picked who got which.

Stuffed Tutu

a little fairy dressup

So maybe we strayed from the eco-friendly party with the loot bag, but I truly believe that they are needed at parties to teach my kids about gratitude and make sure they know that you must thank others for their generosity.  The kids love picking out items for the loot bags and as I mentioned before we look for items all through out the year that would work for a party loot bag so that the budget is spread out a little more.  I also let parents know that if they don’t want the items at their house to leave them with us and we will find a good home for the items.  Everything went home with very happy party guests!

Well just one more day of the party to share and that is the craft that we made, we’ll talk crafts tomorrow!

Cheers,

Jenn

 

Pin It

Tags: , , , , , ,

Then she was 6 and wanted a Fairy party- the food

2 Sep

My daughter is obsessed with as seen on TV ads.  Seriously she wants to try everything, so when she kept mentioning that she needed to make the fruit and veggies into shapes with the Pop-chef I gave in and bought it.  Dada rolled his eyes at us and our wasting of $10.00, but it is sort of awesome, and easy enough for her to use herself.  We’ve been making all sorts of watermelon and cucumber shapes.   For her party we had fruit in shapes and veggies in shapes, it was fun.

Fairy Party Food

fun fairy food

We had some small bowls of candy (sort of a candy buffet) and then some salty treats too.  I had bought butterfly shaped pretzels and completely forgot to put them out!  Too many other fun foods to occupy every one I guess.

For beverages we had apple cider from M2′s favourite stall at the farmers market (actually all the fruit and veggies came from our farmers market, with M2 informing everyone it was for her fairy party).  We also made some fairy punch.  This was supposed to be a Shirley Temple type drink, but turned out more like a bellini the thought of pulp was too much for M2.

Fairy Party Beverages

fun fairy beverages

Fairy Party Punch Recipe:

In a 1.5L Mason Jar mix:  one bottle lemon sparkling water, 1/2 cup of Grenadine, and then mix peach juice to colour.

While researching on Pinterest I came across this pin and M2 knew that is what she wanted for her party.  She wanted Fairy Wand cookies.  So we made them, I used this cut-out cookie recipe though as I did not notice that the original pin had an egg-free cookie recipe.  For the icing I mixed some icing sugar with vanilla soy milk (maybe 1 cup icing sugar to 2-3 tbs soy milk) and it hardened perfectly.  M2 decorated with glitter sugar.

Fairy Wand Cookies

fairy wands instead of cake

I also had some gluten free cereal that the kids did not like eating plain, so I put some together with melted mini-marshmellows and mini m&m’s and magically they all disappeared. The best part of M2′s friends they like to eat anything and everything so there was no food to clean up at the end of the party, it was awesome!

I loved that almost all the food was local and did I mention it was all eaten up!

Tomorrow I’ll show you the loot bag items and yes I do loot bag items even for an eco-party.

Cheers,

Jenn

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pin It

Tags: , , , , , ,

Then she was 6 and wanted a Fairy Party

1 Sep

Last week my baby turned 6, and she starts full days at school this week, my head is still spinning a bit!  She was so excited to have a big, colourful fairy party.  We have been looking at ideas and planning for months, thank you Pinterest!  One thing I have discovered if you want to host eco-friendly birthday parties is you have to plan ahead, look for items all through out the year that can work for the party.  And budget all through out the year for those items that you most want!   Now I can’t lie I still ended up at the dollar store to pick up a few items for the decorations. decorations that will be recycled and reused.  Today I want to share the decorations, because you don’t need to go overboard to make something fun.

Fairy Hangout

Fairy Hangout

This is the part of the park that M2 and her friends hang out in every time we go to the park!  The bridge, the rocks, and the trees all make some fun fairy spots to hang out and play.  So this is where we set up the craft area and later had a fairy photo shoot (yeah to inviting talented parents!)  That table cloth has been used at all all the kids parties for about 6 years now.

Tree PomPoms

over the party snacks

I found the tissue paper pompom pattern here although I used cotton string to wrap around the centre and then left enough to hang up on the branches.  The pink and the yellow tissue paper was in our wrapping stash.   The little lights are from the dollar store and they are LED that run on batteries.  A little wasteful perhaps, but we have already put them up in the kids rooms for some decoration/nightlight action.  I’m tempted to use them also when we go camping to have some fun light around the site.

So that is it all the decorating that I did, because let’s face the natural setting was perfect for a fairy party, we just enhanced it a touch.

Tomorrow I’ll share the food, there was no cake this year…by choice!

Cheers,

Jenn

 

 

 

 

 

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...Pin It

Tags: , , , ,

← Older Entries