Lalaloopsy Party Time!

I know it's been months since I posted.  I'm not really sure if anyone even follows this blog, but it's fun to write it (when I have the time).  Keeping up with a Kindergartener, a beginning ballerina, a toddler with many allergies (they're getting much better), and a ten month old who has learned how to wiggle and scootch his way into everything, keep me very busy and I often take my down time to nap, fold laundry, clean the ever messy house, and cook supper.  (Speaking about supper, I may be blogging about how we're about to change all that, and I may try a little experiment.)

So, back in December, I think, I promised a Lalaloopsy party to come.  So, here it is!!

My only little girl turned four this January, and she is obsessed with Lalaloopsy dolls.  I mean, totally obsessed.  She sleeps with them, plays with them all day, and makes sure that I can recite everyone's full name at the drop of a hat.  LOL!

So, It seemed that a Lalaloopsy party was the only sensible thing to do.

So, here's what I came up with.... (I know, picture overload. But, I just couldn't resist!)


I try very hard to keep our party costs down and to re-use and repurpose as many things as possible.

For the food signs, I used PowerPoint and printed them on card stock.  I'll put the original food signs and blank ones on my printables page.  I tried to make every food selection sound like a Lalaloopsy doll's name.

I also hot glued scrap book paper onto the back of clear plastic trays I purchased from the dollar store.  To jazz them up and keep costs down to a minimum.  (pictured in the bottom left corner of the picture below)
 
I hot glued ric-rac and buttons on to an old milk glass compote I already had.

 I made the sugar cookie button lollipops from a cookie pop recipe I found online (I'll look it up and post a link in a bit)

Obviously I used her mini-Lalaloopsy dolls to help accessorize the food table.  The other bowls and trays were all found in the dollar section at Target.

Strawberry milk and pink lemonade.  Striped straws from the party section at Target.

The table cloth I found at The Dollar Store, in their Valentine's section.  And, I used a sheet I already had to cover up the buffet cabinets, and make it a little more "crafty".  I found the crayon coin banks at The Dollar Store too.

For their little craft/game portion of the day we made little Lalaloopsy apronesses. Inspired by some that I saw on Pinterest, but I wanted to make it more interactive for the girls

I cut out little apron tops, and instead of hemming about 20 tops I just used my surger and surged all four sides.  Then I sewed big buttons on the bottoms.  To make the skirts I did the same thing, cut out the shape out of fabric, and cut out a tulle skirt to go underneath.  Then I sewed button holes to match up with the apron tops.  To sew the button holes in the tulle I made a little cotton "sheeth" (I guess that's what you'd call it.) Sewed it to the top of the gathered tulle and then sewed and cut out the button holes through the cotton.  That kept the tulle from raveling and being a major pain.  My sister came over and helped me, and we had most of the pieces cut and surged in about 4 hours.

We had an accessory table with buttons from my husband's grandmother's stash and my stash of ribbons.  The girls, with their mom's help, fixed up their apronesses however they wanted.  By adding buttons to the skirts or tops and then little ric-rac or ribbon on their apronesses.

For the "doll hair" wigs I just looked at the Lalaloopsy dolls on a little poster we got from one of our many dolls and drew them on and cut them out of foam paper.  I hot glued on foam paper bows and elastic strings to fit on their heads like little headbands.  To emphasize the hair aspect I just used Crayola markers and drew on the details.  This took me about 2 hours.

 

We had the party in the church fellowship hall, so I used as many things I could repurpose as possible.  To make the backdrop I took one of the Sunday School dividers and wrapped a blue sheet around the top.  Then I took green and brown scrap fabrics and cut or pinned them in the hill, and tree shapes to mimic Lalaloopsy Land.  I took some of my leftover foam paper and cut out buttons and hearts for the "berries" on the tree.  To make the sign I just used scrapbook paper and two sheets of white cardboard taped together.  

 

I am an amateur cake baker, so I made her Lalaloopsy inspired cake out of boxed cake mixes, homemade butter cream frosting, and homemade marshmallow fondant.  If you want any details on this just leave me a message.  I think the total party cost was around $150 for food and all, so overall, not a bad party on a tight budget.  I know that's not a good party budget for everyone, but when you plan and use what you have or what your friends may have it helps a lot!  (Now let's see if we can throw a Beatle's first birthday party for about that same cost.)

We actually got so busy making aprons and opening presents that we almost forgot to eat the cake.  All in all it was a very fun, and active day.

Hope you enjoyed the pics!

(I know it was all over the place today.  I've been a little distracted.  LOL!)