Unicorn Party

Kate had a birthday party this weekend.

Her real birthday is in the spring, which we acknowledged with various family get-togethers, but it took us this long to also throw her a friends-celebration. Many reasons, but mainly we wanted to wait till the summer so she could have the sleepover party she'd wanted.

The theme this year was Unicorn(s).

Emily made the welcome signs,

and all the decorations, in unicorn-appropriate colors.

She and Jenna also made the cupcakes (Kate helped with the sprinkles - we used edible pearl glitter). 

I was allowed to make the frosting and test-pipe it on a few of the cupcakes, after which the children banned me from further helping. Party prep sure has changed around here; once upon a time, I actually did most of the work. I'm not complaining, though. 

Also changed is how we actually had themed tableware this year. Shocking, I know. Kate spotted these at Target and asked for them, so I said, "Yes, of course we can have paper products that actually match the theme and each other for a change."

This being a sleepover (translation: we had kid guests in the house for 19 hours straight, instead of the usual 2 hours), we paced ourselves and kept things very, very simple, so there was none of the usual mania that you guys are used to seeing at our parties. 

To begin, Kate had only three guests, which took some negotiating, but it was her first slumber party and we felt that she'd enjoy three good friends much more than eight or ten "fun people" she didn't know as well. 

Also, because unicorns are apparently trending at the moment, choosing the activities, decor and other party elements took far less imaginative energy than usual. Emily and Kate got on Pinterest together and picked crafts and food ideas from the general internet, then executed them indoors in a calm and sane manner, with the resident adults enforcing all the usual kitchen safety (and neatness) rules. 

So rather than a 20-something-post blog series like Emily's Harry Potter party, you get a single paragraph rundown of this Unicorn Party:

After dinner, we made sparkly pearly unicorn lip balm (we used petroleum jelly, Kool Aid powder, sugar to taste and edible pearl glitter). Then we painted our nails and put on face masks. Now, let me state for the record that I personally couldn't see how either of those spa-type activities was particularly Unicorn-y, but it appears that this theme is extremely forgiving and, in Kate's logic universe at least, encompasses all things glittery, sparkly and luxuriating. When everyone was all relaxed and gorgeous, the girls watched a movie and ate popcorn. In other words, we followed all the classic slumber party rules.

Oh, wait - I am happy to report that sometime between Gift Opening and Unicorn Spa, Mother did get to execute one of her own favorite party elements, namely the absurd treasure hunt. You know how I always insist on having this at our parties as an excuse for the party guests to run off some of their crazy energy outdoors, right? And also how I believe that while kids should be as involved in their own party planning as they want, it's a good idea to save something for a surprise on the day itself, so the birthday kid is in on the fun, too.

So this next bit was our secret - Jenna helped with the making and Emily helped with the hiding and the clues.

Here are the kids running around the yard, hunting for their Hidden Secret Packages which we stashed up in the trees for them to find.

Then they all came back indoors and opened their packages together to find these:

four Menagerie unicorns.

I mean, it's a Unicorn party, right?

Each unicorn had a distinct "cutie mark" (if you're familiar with My Little Pony, you'll know what these are) 

so the girls could tell their own unicorn apart from the other three identical ones.

The crazy manes and tails were made with some tri-color unicorn fur I found in JoAnn. 

For privacy reasons, I won't be sharing any photos of the girls' faces when they opened their packages, but there was much screaming and jumping, and squealing of names like Cupcake and Sparkles and Rainbow Baby and Baby Glitter. And later, during the movie, there were brushing of manes and Unicorn Up-dos and other things that were charming and amusing and which boring adults like me would never have even thought of. 

I also never thought an equine Menagerie animal would work as well as this has. I mean, horses are sleek, lanky, long-necked creatures which wasn't exactly like the classic round, squat Menagerie profile. Which is why, in spite of Kate drawing a horse in her original concept sketches, it never made it into the shortlist for the pattern, much to her disappointment.

Well, here you go, Kate. So glad I was wrong. This Unicorn has turned out to be one of my favorites (and Kate's)! 

Harry Potter Party: Chocolate Frogs, Cauldron Cakes & Jelly Beans

When Emily was researching food ideas for her Harry Potter party, she discovered a wealth of ideas and recipes on the internet. It seemed that for every Harry Potter edible, someone in the known universe had a go-to hack for it, with a fancy wrapper to boot. Hardly unexpected, given the heights to which the commercial merchandising of these novelty treats had already been elevated in theme parks, supermarkets and specialty candy stores all over the world. We were overwhelmed, let me tell you. Our challenge, therefore, was not so much finding things to make a party menu as it was leaving out about 95% of the side acts.  

Take Chocolate Frogs, for instance - try Googling them and you'll be spoiled for choice in merely the free printable boxes in which to package them. The boxes! Absolutely mind-blowing. 

Eventually, we narrowed our choices down to three: Chocolate Frogs, Cauldron Cakes and Every Flavour Beans. We also decided against any packaging - all the better to just eat the stuff, we thought. 

1 Chocolate Frogs

Neither Emily nor I have ever had an actual Chocolate Frog, but we'd heard it was plain frog-shaped chocolate, so she adapted a recipe from a youtube video and created her own version with peanut butter in the middle and crispy rice cereal on the bottom. Very tasty. We used this candy mold.

Our ingredients:

• 1 bag of milk chocolate chips (Nestle, Hersheys, Ghiradelli or something fancier if you like)
• About 1/4 cup peanut butter
• About 1/4 cup powdered sugar
• About 1/2 cup crispy rice

Our method:

1. Melt the chocolate chips in a double boiler.
2. Mix the peanut butter and powdered sugar in a small bowl. We didn't add all the sugar at once - its purpose was to turn the peanut butter into a kind of less-sticky dough so it could be worked with easily. Use as much powdered sugar as needed to allow you to comfortably roll the peanut butter into 5/8" balls.
3. Spray the wells of the mold with cooking spray, then wipe clean and dry.
4. Pour the melted chocolate into the mold, filling each well half-full. Tap gently to get rid of air bubbles.
5. Roll each ball of peanut butter "dough" into a cylinder about 1" - 1 1/4" long and place in each well. Do not press it down to the bottom of the well - you want it to remain suspended in the middle of the Frog.
6. Fill the well with more chocolate to cover the peanut butter, stopping about 1/8" to 1/4" from the top edge of the mold - you'll want some space allowance for the crispy rice. Again, tap gently to remove air bubbles.
7. Press a layer of crispy rice into the surface of the chocolate. 
8. Let set (we had to set ours in the fridge), and then flip the mold over a tray or plate and pop out the Chocolate Frogs.

Note: Emily says to warn you that the peanut butter dough is so good that people will eat on its own and you should be prepared to make more than you actually will use in the Frogs, because it is likely to disappear faster than you'd like, particularly if you have wee helpers in the kitchen.

2 Cauldron Cakes

Again, lots of inspiration all over the internet, and it was a matter of picking our favorite combination of taste, ease of preparation and non-likelihood of wilting all over the tray in the late summer heat.

We made the Cakes in three parts:

Part 1: The cupcakes

Our ingredients:

• 1 box chocolate cake mix (or just make your own cupcakes from scratch

Our method:

1. Make the cupcakes according to the instructions on the box or your favorite recipe.
2. When cool, use a sharp knife to cut out a central conical cavity from the bottom of each cupcake, as shown in the photo below.
3. Set cupcakes upside down to await filling.

Part 2: The filling

Our ingredients:

• 1 4oz box instant chocolate pudding (we used the Jello brand)
• 1 8oz container of whipped topping (we used Cool Whip)
• 1 cup cold milk

Our method:

1. Mix the pudding with the cold milk in a medium bowl, using a whisk.
2. Fold in 1/2 to 1 container of the whipped topping, to desired consistency. It should feel like thick pudding.
3. Fill a piping bag with a large nozzle (about 1/2") or without a nozzle, cutting off the tip to make a 1/2" hole.
4. Pipe the filling into the cavities in the upside-down cupcakes.

Part 3: The chocolate frosting

Our ingredients:

• 1/4 cup butter (half a stick), softened
• 2/3 cup unsweetened cocoa
• 1/3 cup of cream or milk
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 to 2 cups powdered sugar
• pinch of salt

Our method (we made our frosting with a hand mixer):

1. Beat the cocoa into the butter.
2. Add half of the cream/milk, the vanilla and the salt.
3. Gradually beat in the sugar to taste, adding more cream/milk if necessary to the desired consistency.
4. Scoop frosting into a piping bag with a small round or flat nozzle.
5. Pipe a ring of frosting around cauldron for a rim, surrounding the filling.
6. Pipe two small rings on the side of the cauldron for handles.

Tragically, this is the only photo we have of the finished Cauldron Cakes.

3 Bertie Botts' Every Flavour Beans

Our ingredients:

• A big jar of Jelly Belly jelly beans from Costco, in a glass serving bowl. No bizarre flavours. No fancy single-serve boxes. Couldn't be simpler!

Minecraft Party: Coloring Bookmarks, Crafting Golden Apples and Find-the-Heads

These are the various paper printable elements of Kate's Minecraft party.

First are the bookmarks.

If I got anything right at all, it is because the children vigorously tutored me in their rendering. The objects below the animals are apparently what those animals "drop" in the game for players to retrieve. Why exactly this is important completely escapes me.

Click HERE to download the bookmark sheets.

This is the checklist for the Square Head Scavenger Hunt:

Very easy to set up - just take photos of the Heads on a white background with individual labels under each Head, and print one for each player.

Then hide the Heads and give each player a checklist card and send them off to find them.

Supply prizes for everyone who finds all the Heads.

The Golden Apple crafting table activity, unlike the bookmarks and scavenger hunt, is actually representative of real Minecraft goings-on. By that, I mean that the guests all recognized this as a bona fide Minecraft event, whereas they stared blankly when we informed them they would be coloring bookmarks and searching for Square Heads. Apparently, there are no disembodied heads in the Minecraft universe and everyone there is too busy building and fighting monsters to actual sit down to color anything.

The prep work for this activity involved making a lot of stickers. We printed out images of golden nuggets and red apples, cut them out 

and turned them into stickers with our sticker maker.

We made enough for each guest to have 8 golden nuggets and 1 red apple.

Then we made square cards like tic-tac-toe boards, which are symbols of the Crafting Table. The completed sample shows the "recipe" to create a Golden Apple.

Our golden apples are golden delicious apples from the supermarket.

On the day itself, all the kids had to do was stick the stickers in the correct configuration and turn in their card in exchange for an apple. Easy. 

However, when I first ran this process by my kids, this ludicrous conversation ensued:

Me: So when they complete their cards...

Kid: You mean "Crafting Tables".

Me: Yes, Crafting Tables. When they complete them, they get a golden delicious. Just like the game! Fun, right?

Other Kid: But will there be a hole in the middle?

Me: What hole?

Other Kid: Where will the Golden Apple appear?

Me (completely baffled): Appear? Grandma's going to give it to them.

Other Kid: But there must be a hole in the middle of the Crafting Table so the Golden Apple can pop out!

Other-Other-Kid (somewhat patronizingly): In Minecraft, Mom, the Golden Apple just appears when you have all the ingredients in place.

Me: THIS IS A BACKYARD PARTY! IT IS NOT THE COMPUTER!

Nnnngrrhhhrhrhrr. So anyway, just to make it clear, we bought, with our credit card, an apple for each kid from the supermarket and put them in a physical container and the kids' physical human grandmother physically received each stickered paper card from each child and put it aside and then physically removed an apple from the physical container and handed it to the child who then closed his/her fingers around it and took it away. 

Grrrrrrr.

Minecraft Party: Candy Jewels

There are all kinds of treasure in the world of Minecraft. We wanted some of ours to be edible, so we made these candy jewels. I found this candy mold at Joann for 99c one day while shopping for fabric and bought it, not knowing what exactly to use it for. And then this Minecraft party came along. Hurrah!

We decided not to make our candy from scratch just to avoid buying candy flavors that we would never use after this party. Instead, we bought a pack of Jolly Ranchers and melted them. Here's what we used in our candy lab:

• cooking spray to coat the form (wipe off the excess with a paper towel)
• hard candy 
• some popsicle sticks (one per color of candy)
• cupcake liners - a lot of them; you'll be using-and-tossing, and 
• a thing to hold the cupcake liners that you can use in the microwave. Ours was a silicone cupcake mold, but you can use a ramekin or something similar. This is to support the flimsy paper liner when pouring and to protect your hand from being burnt by the molten candy.

We used one popsicle stick per color, and one cupcake liner for each round of melting. This is what "each round of melting" entails:

• Unwrap two to three candies of the same color and put them in a cupcake liner. Set that in the silicone mold/ramekin.  
• Melt this in the microwave oven - start with 30 seconds, then add another 20-30 seconds as needed. Check regularly! You may need a shorter or longer time, depending on your microwave and its power setting. When all the candies are completely molten,

pour the liquid into the forms. It will be incredibly bubbly and you will panic and imagine lots of air bubbles trapped in your hardened candy gems. Fear not - they'll all disappear. Use the popsicle stick to scrape it all out. It hardens really quickly, so you'll only be able to fill one row at a time.

• Toss the entire cupcake liner with the remnant hardened candy away. Don't be tempted to reheat it - this tends to change its color and flavor, and not always in a good way.

• Wait a couple of minutes till the candies harden in the forms and then pop them out with your fingernail. They come out really easily.

• Take a new paper cupcake liner and repeat the process with two or three more candies. 

• When you use candies of a different color, use a new popsicle stick.

When the candies were all cool, we packed them in little cellophane gift bags

for trading with Villagers.

Kate's Minecraft Party

This little girl and her Minecraft party. . . !

Let's just say that it was quite the learning experience for me.

I broke all kinds of rules, though. 

Like this poster - with all its no-such-thing-as smiley Good Sport Monsters.

Totally wrong.

Also this lunch setup with no themed tableware and not a single Minecraft decoration.

I tried, though.

I bought vials

to make drinking potions (for whose magical ingredients the girls' contributed ideas and coloring services).

And -only because my kids insist these are a party staple just so they have an excuse to bake - cookies. I was personally very unhappy making square pigs. They are the roundest animals on the planet and making them square felt like a travesty. 

Then there was the issue of cake. Which Kate does not eat. And our favorite gelato shop CLOSED DOWN last winter, so we could no longer have our go-to stand-in blood orange/raspberry sorbet/chocolate gelato pie. 

So we had Birthday Brownie instead. Which, while I would ordinarily never dream of desecrating with frosting, I frosted. The children said it looked like Minecraft terrain this way. And since we were already breaking all the Good Chocolate Confectionery rules anyway, we put square mushrooms on it, which were mini Starbursts dotted with white frosting. Yes, more frosting; at this point, why exercise restraint?

Please note the total absence of any indication of any theme - let alone Minecraft - in the picture below.

Also note the ROUND balloons with ROUND spots. The children asked me if I'd deliberately bought them as an act of rebellion. I confessed Yes. They giggled and said Mom Is So Silly. 

Okay, now that we're done sharing how I utterly failed at the whole Matchy-Matchy Themed Party Atmosphere, let's move on to the activities.

Incidentally, please don't feel bad or slighted or whatever if you happen to love the themed decoration/food/cutlery/drinkbottlelabel approach to parties. I think it makes for fantastic photoshoots, personally. Especially if it isn't raining cats and dogs like it often threatens to do whenever I plan parties. 

My children, however, have told me in no uncertain terms that the most important thing at their parties is the activities. They don't care if the food matches the napkins. In fact, they don't even care what the food is, as long as it's not squid. And often, they want to rush through the tragically non-coordinated lunch portion of the party just so they can get to The Actual Fun Part. 

So. . . Main Event coming up. Be warned: here follows the kind of happy insanity that can only result from collaboration with children. 

First, the filler- and ice-breaker activities. 

Bookmarks -

which my children adore coloring, no matter how old they get.

Instead of the usual printer-paper substrate which we then laminate post-coloring, these we printed on cardstock. We set up the Activity Center in the garage and let the guests color whenever there was a lull in the proceedings.

One of my kids suggested this next game with the Perler bead square heads they'd been making. Originally we'd considered Minecraft bingo, but immediately decided it would be a ridiculous amount of work to make different bingo cards, so we turned it into an indoor scavenger hunt instead, which doubled as an Inclement Weather Contingency Activity. Jenna hid the square heads around our basement living room and the kids were given photo cards and pens to check each off as they found them.

Anyone who turned in a completed card got gold nuggets. It was wonderful watching the older kids help the younger kids find all the square heads.

Then we made mosaic diamond pickaxes, which were foamboard bases

onto which the kids stuck these foam tiles

(it was an exercise in patience, and a good opportunity for visiting)

to make this.

The kids thought it was very cool that they had their own pickaxe to wield. A diamond one, the children informed me, trumped all the other kinds of pickaxes. 

This next activity is my favorite, because it's so crazy.

Minecraft, I've learned, is about being resourceful. You collect things and build and create while surviving against monsters and general evil. One of the ways to amass resources is by mining and trading (hence the pickaxe).

Here are homemade ores. These have emeralds in them, which are a currency for exchange.

We set up these ores in the sandbox and had the kids go collect them

in buckets (to contain the mess, because I don't enjoy cleaning up),

and smelt to obtain the emerald, which is a fancy way of saying, "crumble the thingy with your fingers to get out the green gem." The kids loved it so much that they went back to the sandbox after the party was over to mine the surplus ores to get more emeralds.

Armed with three emeralds apiece, they went out to trade them for other things

with Villagers,

who were Emily

and her older cousins

who'd graciously offered to role-play for us.

Each Villager traded something different for an emerald: a sword key-chain;

a grass block,

which was a kid-painted "blind" box

containing one of these store-bought figurines;

and a packet of edible jewels

which are easier to make than they look!

Another way to obtain things, according to the children, is by Crafting. Which is a dreadfully misleading term for the non-Minecraft-initiated who are more familiar with the more traditional scissors-glue-sticky-tape manifestations. Minecraft-style Crafting apparently involves a recipe and instant gratification, performed on a magical platform known as The Crafting Table (which, humorously enough, you also have to Craft into existence. Long story.).

We Crafted golden apples. The children claimed these have rejuvenating properties. Like caffeine, I guess. 

We made these stickers of non-amazing red apples and gold nuggets

and the kids stuck them in this special configuration on a 3x3 representation of the top of a Crafting Table, which goldenifies the object in the center. 

Then they presented their Crafting Tabletops to Grandma, who did her King-Midas-thing

and swopped them for golden apples. 

To contain and organize all that loot, any self-respecting Minecraft devotee must have a Chest. 

Which is a cardboard cube that opens for storage,

which we mass-produced because cardboard in small amounts is just no good.

These we hid in the yard - according to my expert consultants, in Minecraft, you obtain Chests by Just Finding Them In Random Places. 

And that was a wrap.

It was a perfect day with perfect weather with the only hitch being way too much food so that the kids were too full to eat the birthday brownie after the song was sung and the candles blown out. The grownups, however, sat down after all the guests had gone home, and ate it with copious amounts of ice cream (I scraped off all my frosting) and continued celebrating Kate. 

Happy birthday, little one!

(And I still haven't played a single minute of real Minecraft.)