New Years Eve Party Decorations

Nothing is funner than gathering your friends together to ring in the new year! Here my ideas for a New Year's Eve Gathering!

Serve a potluck - spending all your time cooking will spoil the fun, plus it gives your friends an opportunity to shine!

Make a signature cocktail, with a fun themed name - I made Amber's French Kiss

Make your place sparkle - I glittered a bottle of champagne, and put up string lights. I also added a few large bottles with Christmas lights shoved inside to bookshelves and cabinets. I used shiney gold gift wrapping paper to decorate table tops and the bar too.

Play great music - I used Google Play Music's radio NYE station and had great music I didn't have to worry about!

Midnight Kisses and Noise Makers

I used random crystal bowls and tin buckets to display snacks and food. I found small chalkboard signs attached to paper clips at Micheal's and used them on the bowls.

Drink of the Night: French Kiss

I always *LOVE* a themed drink for a party! With a little research I settled on a French Kiss with a little twist. I used pretty photo frames with black construction paper make chalk boards at the bar, with the name of our special drink.

Amber’s French Kiss Cocktail

1 ½ oz Vodka

1 ½ Pineapple juice

¼ oz Chambord

¼ oz Triple Sec

¼ oz Half and Half

Shake with ice and serve

Glittered Champs

Homemade Confetti

 The kids dumped homemade confetti on us from the balcony at midnight. We used hole punches to make it.

Drunk Gummies

 I made Drunk Gummies for the adults. It is basically gummie bears soaked in vodka in the refrigerator for several days. The trick is to buy the good brand of gummy bears, and let them soak in a glass dish for about 5 days. Any less and they taste awful. I s

Girlfriends having fun!

Me, the bartender!

I decorated the bar with gold and white chevron wrapping paper, and small jeweled blinking lights scattered around the wine and champagne glasses. I made the large BAR light up sign for another party and decided to put it to use in my bar! It is basically made of red construction paper, target lights with a foam board backing (Instructions I used HERE)

Supplies:

Gummy Bears

Chalk Pencil

Chalkboard Clips

Coupe Champagne Glasses

Gold Chevron Paper

Hunger Games Mockingjay Birthday Party

My son loved the Hunger Games book series. By coincidence, his birthday has fallen on the premiere of the movies, so we have held a few Hunger Games themed parties! This year we started with a fun invitation to get the kids in the mood. We started the party with a series of Minute to Win it games and then headed off for the theater. Afterwards we had pizza and the kids watched the older Hunger Games movies. We topped it off with a District 13 Cake, since he was turning 13 and the Mockingjay Part 1 was all about District 13.

For a party favor we made these really fun shirts. We used a "reserve technique". Instead of applying a iron on or stencil, we used bleach to remove color from the shirts. I used freezer paper that I cut out with an exacto knife to make a stencil. Then hung the shirts in the shower and used a spray bottle to apply the bleach. The custom Mockingjay shirts turned out beautifully!

Shirts all ready for the party guests

District 13 Cake - made with powder sugar stencil

Party favors, cake and glow lights ready to go!

Minute to Win it scoreboard

The boys at the theater with their Mockingjay shirts

Hunger Games invite

Click here and use FILE: MAKE A COPY in Google Docs to use my Hunger Games Invitation.

Click here to FILE: MAKE A COPY of my District 13 cutout I used to make the shirts

Lego Mini Figure Storage and Display

My oldest son was a HUGE Lego fan for about ten years and he amassed quite a collection during that time. If your child is into Legos, then you know they create a big mess. So I was always looking for ways to organize the Legos, that also allowed my son to continue to play with them. I wasn't very successful actually! As he got older my focus was to display these beautiful toys in a more mature way.

I finally repurposed this small display shelf to hold their most important minifigs. I used green postboard to cover the back. That served to help see the minfigs better, since they would show better than with a white background. Also the display shelf had star & moon cutouts I wanted to hide. Next I glued down a large Lego plate that I cut to fit each shelf. The height was too high, so I added a half shelves also made with the Lego plate. Then I added in all the Lego Mini Figures that we have collected through the years. It makes a lovely display on my son's wall.

Half way done - before I added more shelves

Star Wars Minifigs

Pirates of the Caribbean - More favorite minifigs

Lego Toy Story Minifigs - old favorites

Lego collectible minifigures

Lego Minifig Shelf