Looking for a super easy, inexpensive party favor to pass out at your next birthday party?

This one really is easy, cheap and will still make the kids smile:

Here’s how you can make these yourself.

1. Collect as many toilet paper rolls as you have guests. Or use paper towel rolls and cut to the size you would prefer.

2. Fill rolls with individually-wrapped candy or trinkets.

3. Cover with tissue paper

4. Tie each end closed with curling ribbon.

5. Pass them out and count the $$ you saved by going this simple route. :)

Back in Germany, she would be celebrating with her brother who shares her birthday, and also with so many in her family who have birthdays in September.  It sounds like her family’s September is quite a month!

She told me that at home the whole family, except her younger brother, comes into her room and sings “Happy Birthday” to wake her up on her big day. Then they go to her brother’s room and she joins the chorus as they sing to them.

Then, when they go to the table for breakfast, the birthday honoree’s spots are surrounded by candles and gifts and there are lots of balloons. Everyone enjoys breakfast together before the school day begins and then, after school, more family comes over to visit and there is a bigger gathering on the weekend to celebrate several birthdays. That sounds like a lot of fun to me!

Shari leaves for school quite early, but we did our best to start her day off right.

This morning we woke our own three children at 5:40 so they could celebrate with her before school. At the breakfast table we sang “Happy Birthday,” ate chocolate chip pancakes, and gave her a gift that each of us helped to pick out. I tried to put candles in the pancakes, but they kept melting. Oh well. We will have birthday cake tonight and can do the candles then.

She called her family back home and let us listen as they sang “Happy Birthday” to her in German and also chatted with her brother to see what he got for his birthday.

And then it was time to head to school.

This evening we will celebrate with her aunt who lives nearby and then we will have a birthday dinner with her new school friends this weekend.

Seeing her anticipation for her birthday all week (well, actually, since she arrived last month) has been a lot of fun me. I can tell that birthdays are a huge deal in her family. I think they were in mine, too. My husband is not nearly as ‘into’ birthdays as I am, but I’m doing my best to compromise.

I’ve had a lot of fun celebrating my children’s birthdays. Two of my favorite celebrations have been our Indiana Jones party and our PJ pancake breakfast bash. My double-decker chocolate chip cookie cake is my most requested cake. (Our Danish daughter put in a request for that one well before her birthday last year.)

All this birthday talk has me wondering… How does everyone else ‘do’ birthdays? How do you celebrate them with your family? Are children’s birthdays and adult birthdays celebrated the same in your house?

Please, do tell. I’d love to know and maybe a borrow a few of your ideas in the years to come…

I’m making some special cupcakes and have to stop to run an errand.

But my kitchen waits… ready for the next step.

(I can’t wait to try it out in a bit!!)

No toys were stolen from my children for these projects… I promise.

Although my son was puzzled when he saw the pieces I borrowed from his stash to make the dots sitting in the sink covered in chocolate. And all three willingly let me take some of their Halloween candy to decorate the castle.

I am really excited to share these cakes tonight at the auction. I hope they do well for the school!

Here are few other baked treats I’ve made for our family:

• Lego Indian Jones Cake:  Part 1, Part 2… complete with snakes between the layers.
• Double-decker chocolate chip cookie cake
• Wicked Sweet Halloween Cake– a modification on the castle you see here
  
• Beary-cute Brownie Bites
  

Our hostess made this adorable edible bunny dip with a bread bowl, rolls, veggies and some spinach dip:

It was too cute to just keep for ourselves. I had to share!

And look at her centerpiece for just one of our tables… she made the moss/ grass runner herself!

I was super impressed!

Everything she served not only looked fantastic, it also was delicious. I didn’t go over there with the intention of blogging about it, but I just had to! The entire event was beautiful: great company, adorable decoration and scrumptious food.

I’m sorry I don’t have pictures of everything, however our gracious hostess agreed to share all of her recipes from the luncheon with us: Print this out and you’ll be ready to host the next ladies’ luncheon at your place:

(Uh-Oh. I’m hosting these ladies in June. What am I going to make?? Maybe I’ll check the VGABS e-book for ideas…)

Anyhow, the delicious recipes for Lemonade Ice cream Pie, Chicken Pasta Salad and Zesty Honey-Lemon Salad Dressing follow: (And the editorial comments come from our hostess, herself)

Zesty Honey-Lemon Salad Dressing

1 Tbsp. chopped fresh parsley

3 Tbsp. honey

1 tsp. lemon zest

4 Tbsp. fresh lemon juice

2 tsp. Dijon mustard

1 garlic clove, pressed

½ tsp. salt

½ tsp. pepper

1/3 cup olive oil

Whisk together chopped fresh parsley and next 7 ingredients in a small bowl. Add oil in a slow, steady stream, whisking constantly until smooth. Use immediately, or store in an airtight container in refrigerator up to 5 days. If chilled, let stand at room temperature 15 minutes. Whisk before serving.

Chicken Pasta Salad

 

3 oz. (1 cup uncooked) shell macaroni  1-1/2 cups cubed, cooked chicken

1 Tbsp. finely chopped onion

½ tsp salt

¾ cup sliced celery

¾ cup seedless green grapes, cut in half

¾ cup mandarin orange segments, drained

¼ cup slivered almonds, toasted

½ cup mayonnaise

Cook macaroni to desired doneness as directed on package. Drain and rinse with cold water. In large bowl, combine all other ingredients. Cover & refrigerate to blend flavors. Makes 6 one-cup servings.

Lemonade Ice Cream Pie

Purchase (never!) or make (always!!) a graham cracker pie crust. Soften a ½ gallon carton of Blue Bell Homemade Vanilla Ice Cream (there is NO other vanilla ice cream, as far as I’m concerned). Thaw a 12 ounce container of frozen lemonade concentrate. Combine the ice cream and lemonade and mix thoroughly. (You can add more lemonade concentrate if you’d like a tarter flavor). Pour onto pie crust and freeze.

**The dip in the bunny bread bowl was made using the Knorr’s vegetable dip packet. The recipe is on the package.

Using straws, a few other things, and a little help from my 3 children, I was able to present these cakes at her party:

Without the straws (Happy Housewife, you ROCK for the tip!) I bet the castle would have been slip-sliding away.

(I know, I got a little carried away with the whole cake buffet, but the castle cake was strawberry and so I felt I should also make an angel food cake for anyone with allergies. Never mind both were coated in sugar!)

So here’s how I did it and what those straws were for:

We decided on a castle cake pretty early in the game and, since I already have the Bundt castle mold, it made it a lot easier to fashion the castle part.

I wasn’t sure how much batter to use, though, so I did a little research and settled on one box plus about 1/3 of a box more. To make this easier (and not waste) I also made a batch of cupcakes for the birthday girl to take to school with the rest of the batter.

But back to the cake…

In using the Bundt, I consulted the Nordicware site and learned to spray the inside with a non-stick spray that also has flour like Baker’s Joy. I was in a time crunch and just picked up my grocer’s brand-equivalent and it worked beautifully. (The last time I used the mold I used the regular non-stick spray and still had some cake stick, so this one definitely helped.)

I filled the mold about ¾ full and then pulled some batter up the steps of the mold to help the batter rise there as it baked. (You can see some of the flour from the spray in this picture.)

I was worried about running out of cake (This was before I decided to make the angel food cake) so I also baked a 9 x 13 sheet cake to go under the castle. I put both cakes in the refrigerator until I was ready to decorate. (The  lines on my sheetcake are from my cooling rack. Those  aren’t anything a little frosting can’t cover. The green things are the straws. More on that soon.)

I frosted the sheetcake and then I did two things to support the castle:

1. I lined a cake circle with foil (any stiff cardboard will do) and placed the castle on top of it to give it a foundation.

2. I cut and placed straws in the sheetcake where the castle would go to support its weight and keep the cake from sagging or sliding.

Once my support was in place, I placed the castle on top with its cardboard tray and covered the foil under the castle with frosting, filling in any holes under the castle with frosting to give it even more of a foundation.

I fashioned a little drawbridge out of part of a Nerd box wrapped in foil and then frosted that and covered it with Nerd “cobblestones.” I poured some blue PopRocks under the drawbridge for water and went to town with Pez, Twizzler Bites, those puffy mint things from weddings and Smarties.

I invited my team of professional candy handlers to help with the task and armed them with those tiny pastel nonpareils. (We won’t go into a story about those from my youth here.) Two of them had a blast making patterns. The birthday girl had a blast sampling candy. I only ate one handful. And everyone won in the end. I added a few princesses and candles and we were almost party ready!

Next, while the kids played with Dad, I baked the angel food cake, cooled it in the ‘fridge and went scavenging for princess toys to decorate it. I thought about drawing a tiara along the side, but went with just sticking one on top instead… Much easier and still exciting for my daughter.

The cakes were a hit. But had it not been for the straw tip, I don’t know what would have happened. I am glad I didn’t have to find out!

I’ve had so much fun making and decorating our family birthday cakes lately.  I used to book a bakery cake the moment after I decided on a party date.  Now I’m having a blast making the cakes and have found that it can be quite easy when I use lots of toys for  props.

Here’s a post featuring an Indiana Jones cake I made using some Legos, gummy worms and “dirt.” I made one for my husband with a toy kayak, bicycle and a few other things representing his hobbies.

For more girl-y ideas,  check out my sister-in-law’s Barbie cake how-to video here (you can do it!) and the cake that inspired the straw lesson here.

For great tips for the kitchen, check out Kitchen Tip Tuesday and for lots of other tips and simple solutions, check out Works for Me Wednesday at We are THAT Family…

This post is also linked to Homemaking Monday, another fun weekly spot to learn great homemaking ideas.

Anyhow, I remembered some cute bear brownie treats I had made for the kids in the past and thought they might work. I showed my son a picture and he decided he liked them. But he wanted some ‘dirt’ on top.

(I put his version of dirt on top of his Indiana Jones birthday cake. Guess it made quite an impression!)

I thought about the brownies, took inventory of what was in the kitchen, and came up with a new twist.

I didn’t have much candy corn, so I also made another version. This time with peanut butter:

No, this does not follow my new clean eating plan or my weight watching plan. But it does fit into my Cool Mom plan.

Here’s what you’ll need to make these simple treats at home, too:

Mini muffin tins

1 package of brownie mix and its requirements (oil, water, egg or eggs)

1 package of bear cookies

Peanut butter (optional)

Candy corn or other garnish. (Personally, I think these would have been cuter with the bears and a candy pumpkin. But I had to go with what I had. You could also go traditionally s’more and use miniature marshmallows, bears and a few chocolate chips.)

For the dirt: ground Oreos or their equivalent mixed with ground graham crackers until you get the right color.

Here’s how to make them:

Preheat the oven to 325.

Mix the brownie batter according to package directions.

Scoop apx. 1 Tablespoon batter into each mini muffin cup.

Bake for 13-14 minutes.

While baking, prepare ‘dirt.’

If NOT using peanut butter:

Remove from oven and press bear cookies and candy garnish into brownie bites immediately.

Sprinkle with ‘dirt.’

Allow to cool 5 minutes and remove from pan.

If using peanut butter:

Allow brownie bites to cool in pan 5 – 7 minutes.

Remove brownie bites from pan and ‘frost’ with peanut butter.

Dip tops into ‘dirt.’

Press bear cookies and any other garnish into peanut butter.

 Final step: Serve with a glass of milk. Or package into shoe boxes and send with your Cub Scout to the camping trip. (Be sure to keep at least one for other siblings and maybe yourself.)

** Check out more yummy recipes at the Scrumptious Sunday Recipe Swap at Happy to be at Home.

Post-Posting note:  These cute treats earned a “Best Scout Theme” award at the campout. My Tiger Cub was quite proud.

About a month ago, we were trying to figure out what to do for my son’s 7^th birthday. Quite a few ideas were thrown around until we came across this. Then we knew what had to be done.

Indiana Jones and a fellow blogger to the rescue!

I recruited Uncle Steve for the mission and copied and pasted the cover from the other blogger’s invitations to use as my own. I used lots of her ideas, making a few tweaks, and everyone had a blast.

As the kids arrived, I ushered them upstairs to our gameroom to play. Soon after, I made my way upstairs and blared the Indiana Jones theme song (downloaded from itunes) Indiana Jones made his entrance, announcing to all that he needed the kids help to celebrate a special birthday and find stolen treasure.

A clue was found in his hat which directed all the kids to find a partner and head to the Mummy Gallery. (I copied and pasted the clues from the other blog. Thank you my friend whom I have never met. You rock!)

The kids made their way downstairs and into a room where I had a placed a laundry basket filled with rolls of toilet paper.

(I bought the toilet paper at the dollar store and shoved the printed clues into the rolls by the cardboard roll.)

The kids loved making mummies and wrapping their friends up in toilet paper.

Once everyone had wrapped enough, Indiana Jones read the clue, which took them outside to the snake pit. (The snakes were from the dollar store which I encouraged everyone to take home with them.)

The kids played a bit and found the next clue, which led them to the “buffet” of monkey brains (spaghetti with vanilla pudding) elephant eyeballs (bouncy balls with vanilla pudding) and snake blood (jello to eat in little plastic containers).

Initially we were just going to have the brains and eyeballs. But the day before the party  my son asked about having everyone drink blood. I found a packet of red jello in the pantry. And the plastic cups had been in there for years. So I made the blood.

The next clue, which had been nestled in the ‘food,” led them to the airplane hangar (our living room), where I had hidden an old trunk under our coffee table.

It didn’t take long for these adventurers to find the treasure.

Inside I had placed all the goody bags (organza satchels from the wedding aisle at Michael’s filled with dollar store flashlight keychains, silly putty, and a bit of candy) covered by treasures (bouncy balls, beaded necklaces and more candy).

While the guests enjoyed their treasures, our son opened his new treasures (birthday gifts) with Dad.

After that, we headed over to the dining room for the cake.

I loved making this cake.

In the past I had ordered birthday cakes from a fantastic bakery… But I think the tide is turning. (You can read about what’s inside here.)

My son really got into it and suggested the dirt on the top. He even suggested I use crushed graham crackers and cookies to do it!

After the cake I set out some snacks and the kids played awhile.

We invited everyone to stay for fajitas, so my husband and I moved into dinner prep mode. He grilled lots of chicken and tortillas, and I set out all the accompaniments.

All in all, it was a fantastic afternoon. I know our birthday boy felt cherished and had a great time… and everyone else seemed to have a blast, too.

Mission accomplished!

(For one of those parties I served pancakes, not cake, by the way. You can read about that here. But I digress…)

This time I’m doing something different.

I’m in the midst of creating an Indiana Jones layer cake.

Tonight I baked the cakes and began the frosting. Now I’m tired and need to sleep. But I just can’t help it. I have to share with you what is waiting for me to complete tomorrow…

And because gummy snakes (worms, whatever) don’t have enough sugar, I thought I might as well go ahead and add some sprinkles…

Next I added the top layer. (The bottom is chocolate and the top will be yellow cake.)

The plan is to frost the outside in chocolate frosting (and keep the snakes frosting-free) and then sprinkle smashed Oreos and graham crackers on top as the dirt. Then I’ll decorate with some Indiana Jones figures. Maybe I’ll have Smiling Bull (the birthday boy) build some Indiana Jones Lego things and just put those on there. I think he would LOVE that. (The dirt was his idea!)

Alright. I’m off to dreamland… with visions of Indiana Jones Legos dancing in my head!

PS Here’s a link to the party post with the completed cake.

And a PS to all my nearby friends who may be reading: We let the birthday guy make his own invitation list this year. It was hard to let him pick and choose who he wanted and not influence his decision-making. (And he was very concerned with inviting only those who he thought would enjoy the whole Indiana Jones adventure.) So yes, some of my very dearest friend’s children are not invited. I do love you… and your kids. But this was Smiling Bull’s call. And we decided to honor that. I hope you understand.