Branching out...

 Hello, everyone!  How are you?

I've been considering expanding the range of topics on my blog for a very long time now.  I really do LOVE makeup and beauty products, but that's not the only thing I'm interested in and I really want to post different content.  Of course, I'll still upload beauty related posts and my seasonal empties (to help keep me accountable for using up the products I've hoarded over the years), but they just wouldn't be the only type of content I post anymore.  I'm very much into crafting, cooking & baking, decorating, fashion, and of course being a parent.  Incorporating my other interests into my blog is something I've longed to do for a while now, and I've decided to just go through with it.

For my first post away from beauty, I thought I would show you my most recent project.  I recently planned my son's second birthday party.  It was just with close family, so nothing huge and crowded and it happened to be nice out that day so we were able to be in our backyard for most of it.  We didn't get to have my son's first birthday party due to covid, so I was very excited to plan this one.  The party was train themed since my son loves trains.  Also, I saw posts on Pinterest that said, "Chugga Chugga Two Two" and I loved that.  Of course, after I started planning and making decorations, my son got REALLY into Mickey Mouse.  He literally showed no interest in Mickey Mouse until after I started making train decorations.  lol  I *could* have changed the theme, but I hate wasting things (especially my limited time) so we went ahead with the train theme anyway.  My son honestly didn't care.

 

My husband gave me a Cricut Explore Air 2 last Christmas and I'm definitely putting it to use by making all of the decorations myself.  I found a train image that I cut out using my Cricut machine and then adhered pictures of my son throughout the last two years to them to make a picture train.  I love this idea.  In fact, it's still up in my hallway.  I'll probably take it down when it starts to fall off the wall.

I scoured Pinterest for ideas for the train themed birthday party, and someone way cleverer than I am used two glass jars to hold straws and plastic utensils.  For the jar of straws they labeled it "Chugga Chugga" and the utensils were labeled "Chew Chew" and I cracked up like a lunatic.  I knew I had to borrow that idea for my son's party.  I had my cricut draw the outline for the letters and I used a blue highlighter to fill them in.  I tried to cut the labels out to look like steam.

 

 

The next decoration I made was a "Happy Birthday" banner.  I wanted the banner to look like a train and on each train car there would be a single letter to spell out HAPPY BIRTHDAY.

*I'm just going to add this here - My husband and I rent the house we're living in and the walls were painted this green when we moved in.  We do plan on painting eventually (we were given the OK to do so when we moved in) but we just haven't gotten around to it yet.*

 

I was originally going to use red card stock for the engines and cabooses but decided on black at the last minute, so I used an extra red set to add to the wall because why not.  lol  It only occurred to me just now that I should have put a picture of my son in the car.  Oh, well!

 

I had my husband place black electrical tape to our floor to look like train tracks.  My husband did his best, but he thinks it looked more like hopscotch than train tracks.  We only had it in our main hallway from the front door into the hallway.  Having it go throughout our entire house seemed excessive.

 

Finally, I used my cricut to cut out letters to spell "Chugga Chugga Two Two" and adhered them to our wall.  I used card stock when I probably should have used vinyl because I had to use A LOT of tape to keep them up on the wall.

 

I made white and chocolate cupcakes in the shape of a 2 and used green frosting, black gel icing, and Kit Kat bars to make them look like train tracks.  I purchased this little train from Target, washed it, and then placed it on top of the middle of the 2.  This is something else I saw on Pinterest and I'm very proud of how it came out.

 

I had all of the snacks in bowls and was going to label all of the bowls to look like train cars, but time got away from me and I wasn't able to.  But that's everything I did for my son's birthday party.  I can't wait until next year to be able to do it all again!  Hopefully by then more people will be vaccinated and we can have a bigger party with more than just family in attendance.

 

Do you decorate for your children's birthday parties?  What's your favorite that you've either done yourself or seen?  I'd love to know!

Thank you for stopping by, and I hope you enjoyed this non-beauty related post!