Train Party

I'm declaring this week Party Week on my blog!

I'm going to spend the week highlighting some of my favorite parties that I've done for my boys.  I'll admit, they take a lot of work and they totally stress me out, but they are so worth it when I look back at the pictures.  

I'll also confess, that when I was planning these parties and taking pictures for them I had no intention on starting a DIY blog, so the pictures are not always that great and not always on-point for what I should have been focusing on.

One of my earliest party planning experiences was for my then-three year old.  He was really into trains at the time and I was just getting into reading other blogs so I spent hours looking through DIY blogs for ideas (I'm pretty sure this was pre-pinterest for me).

I scavenged the internet looking for scrapbook paper, stickers and pretty much anything else I could find.  I ended up going with the Lionel Train theme in orange and blue.  I wish I had kept record of where I got everything, but unfortunately I didn't and I'm sure by now there are tons of way cuter things out there to choose from. 

Isn't this banner insane!  Looking back at it now, it's a bit overkill and should have been broken up into two separate banners, but at the time I thought it was the bomb digity! To make the triangles, I used Lionel Train scrapbook paper with orange and blue cardstock.  To make the letters, I used the die cut machine at school (I'm an elementary school teacher by day).  However, now with all of the Silhouettes and Cricuts out there I'm sure there's an even easier way to do it.

For the tables, I printed different pictures of trains and used the die cut from school to cut them into puzzle pieces.  I thought it would be a little something fun for the kids to do.  I also used a piece of the Lionel Train scrapbook paper as a center piece on top of a blue tablecloth.  Finally, I placed some of the train whistles that I used as thank you gifts.  (I do remember that I ordered the train whistles from Oriental Trading.)

 

On to food...

If I remember correctly, seeing a version of this train on a blog somewhere (I really wish I could remember the blog) is what gave me most of my inspiration.  I already had these bins in our playroom, so I washed them out and used them as food containers.  To made the wheels, I taped on silver cupcake holders and added a Lionel Train sticker in the center.  I also added some signs with some twine accents and labeled the food.

I turned one of the large red bins upside down and put a blue bin filled with animal crackers on top.  

The next bin was filled with raisins, one of my sons favorites, and I added a sign that said, "Organic Coal."

In the green bin I had pretzel sticks, or "Pretzel Logs."

Finally, in the blue bin, or caboose, I added Chex Mix.

I also dipped marshmallows in chocolate.  I didn't have any round sticks so I used popcicle sticks and added a Lionel Train flag on top using scrapbook paper and stickers.  The white tray I had bought at Target and I added a blue ribbon with a 3D Lionel Train sticker.

I also bought a box of rice crispies from Costco and dipped them in chocolate and a crushed up  Butterfinger candy bars.  I choose Butterfinger because I wanted one that had an orange center.

I also had chocolate covered pretzels (a must at every party).

For the thank you gift table I printed a little note from my son thanking everyone for coming and we gave out wooden train whistles from Oriental Trading.  I also printed a thank you message on labels and put them on the bottom, but they didn't stick very good to the wood.  

Okay, I know I left out the cake...I did that on purpose, because it really wasn't anything spectacular.  What happened was, while we were at Costco picking up food, my son insisted we get a balloon cake.  So we did...

 

 

See, nothing to write home about. However, in an effort to make it at least match the party I had them make the balloons blue and orange and then I added sticks with the Lionel Train stickers on top.

So there you have it, a train party that doesn't break the bank and turned out pretty darn cute!