Birthday Banners and Moustaches

So, ya know how some kids have these huge blowout birthday parties every year and they have tons of cool decorations and tons of food and it's all perfectly coordinated and beautiful?  Yeah, well, we don't do that.  Why?  Well, because I'm poor and I have four kids.  If I had big huge birthday parties for them every year, we're talking over a thousand dollars a year.  I don't know about you, but I don't have an extra thousand just hanging around not being spent.  So, because E was a stay at home child, not a daycare child, this is her first year to have lots of little friends.  Sadly, J has never had a birthday party with friends either.  He's finally come out of his shell a little bit so we decided to let them have a joint birthday party this year. 

So, I have spent the last week frantically working on birthday party stuff on the few days I had off from work.  E decided she wanted a Snow White theme and J, of course, wanted Mario.  Well, at least their colors coordinate - red, royal blue and yellow.  I can work with that. 

So, first things first.  I knew I HAD to make a banner.  I spent entirely too much time at Hobby Lobby looking at scrapbook paper before deciding on solid red and yellow for their banner.  I got out my trust Cricut (thanks Mom) and went to work.  I cut yellow letters and white shadows of the letters to go on my 6 x 6 red banner piece thingees (yes, that is the official name).  Then I used my trusty clear straight edge ruler thingee (also the official name) to center the letters and mark where my holes should go. 

Then I strung it all together. 

Yes, I know I should be embarassed about how awful my table looks.  Sadly, this is how it looked most of the week.  We have leftover scrapbook paper, Body by Vi shake mix, E's library book, Pop-Tarts, my handheld mixer, and all of the banner stuff.  Nice, huh?  Just keeping it real folks. 

The other thing I knew I had to make for the party was the ever popular Moustache On A Stick.  Because it was a Mario themed party, I traced out a Mario style moustache and traced a bunch out on a black foam sheet.

I cut them all out and glued them on wooden dowel sticks. 

I'll show you what else I made for the party later in the week.