Aviva's rainbow/paint party

Last year my sister in law and I pulled off something short of a miracle. If you throw last minute birthday parties, then you're a miracle worker as well. Aviva wanted a rainbow party for her 5th birthday. Lemme tell you, homegirl is obsessed with rainbows. Instead we took that idea and ran with it mixing a bit of a paint/artist themed party as well. It was colorful, cute and def worth it all. 

Let me add that all the things we found were from Party City, Dollar Tree, Walmart, Target, Hobby Lobby and (god bless) Amazon Prime. These places are your best friends when it comes to party decorations.  

 I think you could never go wrong with streamers. They are cheap, easy to use, come in every possible color and add a little more personality to any celebration. 

 The clear paint cans and paint brushes were bought in separate sets off of Amazon. The brush handles were originally that natural wood color but painted with acrylic paint. The paint cans stuffed with tissue paper to match. 

 This picture is deceiving because you think it looks easy enough to make but oh lawd. This rainbow balloon was the bane of all the decorations! *sigh* We picked up a balloon strip from Party City and if you can master using these to make those awesome balloon arches/columns then teach me your ways. Otherwise you will fight with balloons popping, coming off the strip or not sitting right on top of each other. With a metal arch and some tying up, we finally got the arch to sit like a damn arch. It was a big team effort on this one. My father in law ended up picking up the metal arch from a Home Depot (or Lowes?) to stick into the ground and anchor the balloons with string. 

Can't get enough of this backdrop. I'm so proud of it. Its made from $1 tablecloths, an iridescent string backdrop from Amazon, "clouds" from pre-made white tissue paper poms and a giant white piece of paper to attach it all too. I'm not even sure where or why my SIL had giant paper scrolls but she did and now I'm thinking I need some. I can't even remember seeing them, but I imagine its like those carts they had in grade school with giant rolls of paper on them. These carts held like 6 different colored paper rolls and were a b*tch to push around even though it was wheeled. .. paper is super heavy y'all and no one ever talks about that. 

Here are some more of those paintbrushes, but stringed into a garland. Yes, we is crafty, we is creative. The rainbows table toppers were made from a foam ring cut in half, colored felt hot glued on that foam, and cotton balls glued onto more foam circles to make the cloud bases.

I explained that like crap but if there's a will there's a way and I know you can make them..wey.

 I don't care what anyone says, all you need is a treats table. We went with various 

yummies. Rainbow lollis, gumballs, Skittles and Twizzlers...oh, my! Even treat bags to fill up but let's be real half of the treats are more for show, the aesthetic and I'm not even mad.

 The rainbow cupcake cake was from a store bakery, I think Vonns? I'm not sure, we had this party in California and I'm from Texas. So we have HEB and they have Vonns or what the ever....who cares! Point is don't sleep on grocery bakeries. 

 I probably ate about 1/4 of these paintbrush Rice Krispie treats. All credit goes to Abby my SIL. She

basically melted a bunch of chocolate candy (fyi you can find these already colored melts in the cake decorating aisle) and dipped all of these Rice Krispie treats. You can make homemade ones and mold them into rectangles but ain't nobody got time fo dat. Stick some popsicle sticks into the opposite end and ta-da. Sorry I don't have a better image but you get the idea:

...and these Twizzlers, idk why I took this picture but I'm including it anyways. haha We also used some of the clear paint cans for candy, taping on more of our painted brushes.

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Aviva's outfit

 

Aviva's rainbow crown was made by my sister in law, and although I can't go into detail how she quite did it, I do know it was made with star twine, and curled ribbons tied to the back.

She measured the circumference of Aviva's head for the crown portion and then measured down her back to get an idea where to cut the length of the ribbon. She then curled the ribbons with scissors. I know, I know...ITS FREAKIN CUTE!!!

Her shirt was picked up from Target. I've learned to dress her in something that's comfortable and not a giant itchy tutu. Being an active kid and a summer baby means comfort is a big thing for us. July is  too hot for me to subject her to giant cupcake dresses.

I even made sure to use colorful hair ties for her bday hair. ;)

 

It don't stop there sis, baby Abby had to have a fit too. 

 One year later and for whatever reason baby Abby feels the need to stick her face to her shoulder to "pose" like she's trying to hold the worlds smallest violin

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Party activities

You can't have a paint party without some painting. Acrylic paint is super cheap and dries quickly. You can buy packs of canvas boards for relatively cheap as well. If you want to buy stretched canvases those are also sold in sets of 2-4 being the cheapest at Walmart. This is a great make-and-take craft that I wish someone threw a party like this for me and my artsy fartsy friends. But with, Copic markers instead of $1 packs haha...and wine....

I also did a little face painting, but the face paint wasn't the best and the color pigmentation left much to be desired. If I could go back, I would have ordered an actual set you use with brushes. I secretly think I could do some legit face painting but I like to have this mindset in general. You know the kind where you think something's easy until you actually try it and its not (i.e. balloon arch)

 We also did a piñata, which is mucho fun. If you can find the uncle(s) to rig them up with the ropes you have lying around. More points if your Uncle is a Tio and does it single handedly with a beer in the other hand.

Cupcake decorating was the final activity and thank goodness my SIL thinks of these things for the kiddos. We took all the white cupcakes from the rainbow cupcake cake and used paint holders for sprinkles. Again, you can buy the paint holder/palettes in a pack of 8 or something from Amazon.

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of course we did presents and cake as well...

hope you feel inspired my creative friends ;)

signing off,

the kids are making a mess