Little Mama‘s DIY Jessie Toy Story Party was ready to go after a few weeks of preparation (see our Toy Story party prep post here). We were so excited, and a little… overwhelmed.
Little Mama noticed she was matching from head to toe with her decor but didn’t quite know how to process all of it. I knew this could potentially happen, as preparation normally takes over the first couple hours of party day, and the little birthday girl is blindsided by all chaos.
So, to keep the crazy to a minimum, I prepared the yodellin’ feast ahead of time at home, and placed each of the settings in a particular (alternating) order so that it would be a quick placement on to the tables at the party room. I kept the cups simple between red cups we already had in stock from previous parties, and a handful of printed cups that came with a plethora of Cow print party supplies
Added touch – we took her Toy Story toys and placed them methodically in the center of the table as we chose not to place the main dishes at the centre of the table. Because… sticky fingers.
Each kiddo got a plastic cowboy hat to wear for the party. I was prepared for a good number of kids that would choose not wear their hats, and chalked it up as an added bonus to the festive table decor.
Besides, kids are all about fun, bold colors. And we weren’t lacking in that department, that’s for sure.
We can have a ton of fun with the decor, but what is a party and fun, bold colours, if the food isn’t a big part of it? We decided to integrate some of the Toy Story sayings with our food display. Stay tuned for more of our food selection coming up tomorrow on the blog.
Remember our transformation from paper towel holder to Buzz Lightyear’s super sleek spaceship? Well… here’s the finished product. No biggie. Just put together something that resembled a space ship – okay, more of a space needle (priority was given more to Buzz actually getting a homemade space ship from left over craft scraps, than to what Buzz’s actual space ship looked like…just so we’re clear). I used a cupcake holder from Little Mama‘s last birthday (yay for recycling!) as the base to host small, preschool-friendly sized pizzas. How convenient, as this would be the station known as “Pizza Planet”.
I swear, that wasn’t even planned. Love when that happens.
I know hot dogs aren’t the most nutritious choice, but…
It’s a Toy Story party? How can we not take full advantage of Slinky the Dog?
And if we’re going to get really nit picky, why not make Toy Story labels on the condiments? I mean, all it took was a piece of paper, copied the existing condiment trimming, and played around with names. This was a double sided tape kind of job, as I wasn’t sure how the plastic bottle would fare with a hot glue gun.
During Little Mama‘s Jasmine’s Make 4 Wishes Birthday party, we had a very successful “Make a special wish for the birthday girl” station. We decided to resurrect this plan once again this year. We love reading what Little Mama‘s friends and family wished for her. This worked out well for Toy Story, as we had some boots that were literally collecting dust at home as they no longer fit Little Mama‘s growing feet. Why not make it into a Wish boot where Woody would proclaim “There’s a WISH in my boot!”, rather than the proverbial snake – because, correct me if I’m wrong, but wishes are so much better than snakes…
Our DIY Jessie Toy Story Party goodie bags were in true babyStylista form. We weren’t about to make bags if we already had these ridiculously adorable transparent cowboy boot plastic mugs from Oriental Trading Company, now could we? With a sheriff badge, bound by natural raffia ribbon – every child got their own personalized goodie boot.
Yes. I must have way too much time on my hands. (Nope. No I don’t. I’m just a sucker for punishment…). But seeing the kids so happy with their own personalized badge and cup?
WORTH. IT.
Of course, the little sidekicks that came with Little Mama‘s guests, aka their younger siblings – couldn’t be ignored. As I mentioned in our preparation post, she specifically requested for younger siblings to come. Little Mama has a soft spot for littler people, so it was just important to acknowledge the mini mini sheriffs among us. These Western sippy cups, also from Oriental Trading company were as much a hit as the cowboy boot cups were. Ya-hoo!!
We love to take this once-a-year opportunity to revisit Little Mama‘s past milestones. Of course, we wouldn’t be us if we didn’t find a way to tie it into the western theme. We used a silhouette of a boot and had our way with all the black space, filling it in with Little Mama‘s interests, passions, quirky isms, and pet names. The boot silhouette was an easy find as was the wooden background – the biggest challenge was trying to fit in all the words that accurately described our 5 year old little cowgirl.
Some added touches that brought our DIY Jessie Toy Story Party theme together:
- Signage to direct where the little sheriffs can go – printed on matte cardstock, made simply by western font and wood effects as a backdrop, cut into wooden arrow signs, taped on to an upright pole. (We got creative and used an old body form pole we had lying around the house).
- Jessie herself, in life sized form (pre-school life sized, that is… I mean, you don’t want to scare the little sheriffs!) to warmly welcome the guests as they come into our Toy Story Playhouse. Again, I used a stand we had at home along with a small stool that Little Mama usually keeps at her bedside. We adorned it with a natural coloured Hawaiian luau hula skirt
, which was way less complicated than creating a haystack as her base. Same effect, less stress.
- Balloons in the theme colors, red, yellow, and cowprint. All of which we distributed to our colourful little sheriffs as they left the party. We even had a bunch left over that we later handed out to kids we passed by outside. Boy, were we greeted with some happy kiddos! (and not so happy parents… Whoops!)
- A Jessie Western shirt inspired backdrop (To see how we made it, come visit our prep post here)
- Toy Blocks with Little Mama‘s name.
- A few Toy Story themed desserts. The rest of the food was spread over 2 other serving tables. Otherwise the main table woud get too packed and the fun little details may get lost in the chaos.
- The Jessie-inspired cake. Oh… the cake!!
All in all, the decor, came together flawlessly. However, the preparation took a big chunk of our time – I’m not going to sugar coat it. One thing I learned was to do as much of the preparation ahead of time so there is little room for confusion, or negotiation. We mapped it out and knew where everything was going to be placed. By doing mock set ups at home (from the backdrop, to the table setting, to the food table), we were able to cut time in half. Okay, so half meant a whopping 40 panic-filled minutes of set up… but still.
Whether you’re doing a DIY Jessie Toy Story Party for 20+ kids, or a low key party at the movie theatre, prep is key. Leaving anything to last minute just means more drama for big mama. And yes, planning ahead takes time, and often takes over our kitchen table (among a zillion other surface areas in your home) but it’s worth the temporary insanity.
I mean… when your the tiny cowpoke in your life is THIS thrilled to have their most favourite movie splattered against a clean palette of white, you just do what you gotta do, right?
Want to see how we could possibly transform food into Toy Story food? Come, visit us tomorrow on the blog to see what we came up with as far as yodellin’ eats in our Toy Story Party series. It was quite the adventure, and preparing for the big day was no easy feat.
But we all know…
Jessie never gives up! Jessie finds a way!
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