Sunday, April 13, 2014

Rowan's Third Birthday!!!

(Cross-posted to Little Red Rowan)

Rowan's 3rd Birthday party (12)

Rowan is 3 years old. Can we just take a moment to marvel at that?

Rowan's 3rd Birthday party (30)

Ro's Bday Photo Shoot (27)

We couldn't celebrate his birthday on the 11th (more on that later), so we did a party with the grandparents the weekend before. We decided to have a Pigeon Party, since he totally love the Pigeon Books, and so do I.

Hot Dog Party Invite_blur

It was very cute and laid back. I realized (today) that I had ideas for games, but I didn't actually do anything for them. We had only invited one other kiddo, and she and her parents couldn't come because SOMEONE decided to show up in their family a few weeks early. So it was only adults, so I guess we didn't need games.

I made pigeon cake pops ...

Pigeon Cake Pops (9)

Beth gave me a cake-pop pan to try. This makes the balls with just cake, not cake mixed with frosting. So it makes them healthy, right?!

Pigeon Cake Pops (5)

The only problem(s) with this method is:
1) when the balls get stuck in the pan. After a few batches, I found that COPIOUS amounts of Pam/cooking spray does the trick. I mean COPIOUS amounts, on both pans. Crisco/grease didn't work.
2) I only had one pan, so I could only do 12 at a time. It took about 4 batches to get through all the batter I had, which was about an hour of baking, plus about 10 minutes in between each for cooling. It took A LONG time.
3) the wrong amount of batter means to balls are not quite round. Too much leaves a little seam around the ball, and too little leaves the ball a little flat on top.

But in the end, they were pretty good.

Pigeon Cake Pops (8)

Beaks. The cake pop book called for candy-covered sunflower seeds. You can buy these online or at baking supply stores, but only in big huge bags. I needed approximately 20. So I just took some of my candy melts, made them yellow, and covered a few seeds from my tin of trail mix.

Pigeon Cake Pops (1)

Pigeon Cake Pops (3)

It was ok, Probably needed to thin out the candy more (as I noticed later while dipping the pops), but not too bad.

Cake. I used this recipe, and it was AMAZING. Cut it in half, and it was STILL a lot of cake.

Pigeon Cake Pops (4)

Dipping. Colored the candy melts blue, and thinned it out with vegetable oil. I needed to thin it A LOT more than I remember doing in the past, but it was so thick. I had just enough for 24 pops.

Pigeon Cake Pops (13)

Eyes. Wilton makes candy eyes, but again, I didn't need 100 of them. And I was trying to do this a inexpensively as possible. I colored the eyes with gel color, white/sparking and black. It worked pretty well, though some of them "dropped" a little.

Pigeon Cake Pops (11)

But they were yummy!!!

Rowan's 3rd Birthday party (26)

Rowan's 3rd Birthday party (31)


Decorations. God, I love Pinterest. So many Free ideas for Free decorations.

I chose the pigeon balloons ...

Rowan's 3rd Birthday party (5)

and pigeon toilet paper rolls (printable template here) ...

Rowan's 3rd Birthday party (7)

... and the classic streamers and balloons and my mom's birthday banner.

Rowan's 3rd Birthday party (14)

Rowan's 3rd Birthday party (4)

Rowan's 3rd Birthday party (12)


Food. Well, it was a Hot Dog party, right!!!

Hot dogs and mac & cheese (with french fried onions like at Eatery). 

Rowan's 3rd Birthday party (11)

Rowan's 3rd Birthday party (3)

Rowan's 3rd Birthday party (16)


And then presents. We decided on a play Coffee Maker and a balance bike. However, he's still too short for the bike. With the seat ALL the way down, he can JUST touch the ground with his toes. So I guess we'll stick with the tricycle for a few months.

Happy Birthday, kiddo!!!

2 comments:

Arpita Byrnes said...

Where can I get this invite printable! ? Love it!

Mollie Hartford said...

Hi Arpita! I have this as a photoshop file. If you can use that, email me at toughloveknitters@gmail.com and I'll send it to you.
Thanks!
mollie