3 Ways to Use Formula Cans In Your Birthday Decorations

As you know my daughter had her 1st Birthday Luau last month and I had these projects I wanted to share. I had a ton of empty formula cans and I wanted to somehow use them at her birthday party. Here's 3 ways I used her empty formula cans as decorations at the party:

Here's part of the table centerpieces. I glued Luau garland all around the can then taped those cute pineapples and Luau girls to the top of the can to help make them taller.

I used a few cans as a holder for the leis. I just covered the can in scrapbook paper and put the leis inside. Every table had one of these.

I had one of these very small cans that was a sample from my pediatrician. I covered it in paper and used it to hold the silverware at the food table.

Birthday Series: The Best Chocolate Cake Recipe!

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Cake

Ingredients:

2 Cups Boiling Water

1 Cups Sugar

1 1/2 Cups Buttermilk

1 1/2 Tsp Vanilla Extract

1 Cup Vegetable Oil

2 Eggs

1 Tsp Salt

2 Tsp Baking Soda

1 Tsp Baking Powder

2 Cups Flour

3/4 Cups Unsweetened Cocoa Powder

Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Boil the water and add the sugar. Stir until the sugar is dissolved. Set aside to cool. Once cool mix the sugar water, buttermilk, vanilla extract, oil, and eggs together. In a separate bowl mix the salt, baking soda, baking powder, flour, and cocoa powder. Mix the dry ingredients into the wet. (This is a very wet cake mixture) Pour into 2 9x9 pans or divide into cupcake tins. Bake for 22-25 minutes until done.

Icing

Ingredients:

2 sticks of unsalted butter

6 oz. semi-sweet chocolate chips

1/2 cup heavy whipping cream

2 1/2 cups powdered sugar

In a saucepan melt the butter, chocolate chips and cream. Once melted and smooth, add the powdered sugar slowly. Let icing sit (or refrigerate) until thick enough to frost the cake. This makes a very fudgy, delicious icing.

Birthday Series: Design Your Own Custom Cupcake Toppers

Instead of a cake at my daughters birthday party we decided to have cupcakes. I wanted to purchase some cupcake toppers to decorate her cupcakes but after seeing the price, I decided to make my own. It was very easy and I had everything I needed so I didn't even have to go out and buy anything. Here's how to do it.

You will need:

• Patterned paper. I used the scraps from my birthday banner!
• Circle stencil. Different size circle cutters or punches would work too.
• Tape
• Glue
• Scissors
• Toothpicks
• Access to a computer and printer

First you want to make your circles. I wanted three different sizes for a layered look. I used this circle stencil I got from a scrapbook store a long time ago.

First you want to trace your biggest circle and cut it out of your paper.

Then you want to attach your largest circle to the toothpick. This is the trickiest part. I tried a couple of different ways and found the way that worked best for me. I turned the paper over, placed the toothpick where I wanted it, and put a small piece of tape over it. You want to position your toothpick so that you give plenty of stability to your topper and have enough left to stick down in the cupcake. 

Then put a thin layer of glue on the paper and attach the 2nd circle to the backside. So both sides of your topper have the patterned paper facing out.

Then if you want, trace and cut a smaller circle out and glue it inside the larger circle on both sides.

Then you want to make your smallest circle which will be the focal point of the topper. I chose to put the saying "Oh What Fun Jada Is One" on one side and a picture of Jada's face on the other side. I did this using powerpoint. I inserted a small circle shape in a powerpoint slide and typed the saying in the circle in a cute font. Then I inserted a picture of Jada, cropped it very close to her face, and inserted it in the middle of a circle. Copy and paste the number of circles you will need and print it out.

After you cut your circles out glue them on either side of your topper and that's it! You're done. These turned out so cute and I can't wait to see all of them on Jada's cupcakes. I will insert a picture of them on her cupcakes after her party!

Birthday Series: Custom Birthday Banner Under $5

This post it the first in a birthday party planning series coming up. My daughter will be 1 in less then 2 weeks so I am knee deep in party planning mode. I've been planning for weeks now and I'm going to share how I get ready for a party in a series of posts on here.

This first one is a tutorial on how to make your own birthday banner. It is very easy and cheap. Let's get started!

You will need:

• Patterned paper: I purchased this pack of 12x12 paper at Wal-Mart for $5. There are 50 sheets in this pack with makes it $.10 a sheet which is great. Our party is a Luau theme so I went with this flower paper.
• String: I purchased a string called natural Jute at Hobby Lobby. For 225 feet it was regular price $2.99 but it was only sale for $1.79 (40% off).
• Basic Supplies: scissors, a pencil, tape, glue stick, and a long ruler or something long and straight. You will see I use a long piece of cardboard.

Ok for the first step you want to cut triangles out of the paper in as many as you need. I was making a banner that says "Happy Birthday" so I needed 13 triangles. I wanted to be able to use as much of the 12x12 paper as possible to make the triangles so they would be big and there would not be a lot of waste. The easiest way to cut out same size triangles without having to do a lot of measuring is to first make a small pencil mark in the middle of the paper. Since this is 12x12 paper I used a ruler to make a mark at the 6" mark like this:

Then you simply want to make a straight line connecting your dot to each opposite corner of the paper. You will want to use something long and straight for this. A ruler wasn't long enough for me so I just used a piece of cardboard I had on hand:

Once you've drawn a line from the middle of the paper to each opposite corner you will have a triangle drawn out that looks like this:

So now all you have to do is make two cuts along your lines to cut out your triangle

Continue this process until you have as many triangles cut out as you need.

Next you will want to make your letters. If you are good at free hand, you can draw your letters on paper and cut them out. I am not good at this so I used the computer. I typed "HAPPY BIRTHDAY" in Microsoft Word and made the font really big. 550pt. You will want to use a bubble font, where the inside is white, so you don't use so much ink and if you want your letters to be white. I chose white because my paper was very colorful. You could also make different color letters by using colored paper. I chose white card stock. 

After you print out your letters, cut them all out. Make sure to cut the insides too.

Once you have all your letters cut, attach them to your triangles. I used a glue stick to do this.

After you have all your letters attached you want to attach the triangles to string or ribbon. I just used tape to attach the string to the back of the letters. 

If you are using 12x12 paper, this banner turns out to be very big. I did Happy on one string and Birthday on the other string to hang below it.

Here's some pictures of the finished product! I can't wait to hang it at her party.