Eli's Weather Party.

Eli is our redemption "rainbow baby", the baby born after our loss of Maelee. But he is a boy. So I can't, you know, dress him up in rainbows everyday and I couldn't justify having a rainbow party for his birthday. Even though I really wanted to! But then he started to get REALLY into the sky and clouds and wind and the sun and it dawned on me: We can have a weather party! Because rainbows are a part of weather!

Add in Pinterest and my own scattered ideas and you got our weather party for Eli's second birthday, which fell perfectly on Saturday the 27th this year. There are loads of things you can do for a weather party and I think especially for older kids. But we still had fun! I tried representing all types of weather, but rainbows DEFINITELY took over!

I wanted to keep the guest list small to minimize my crazy. I tried not going over-the-top. I did on a few things. But let me tell you, oh deary, I could have gone WAY WAY WAY more crazy. I recall walking through Party City and my mind in complete overdrive on all the things that could be done and created with all their colored items.

Appropriately for a weather party, I suppose, was it rained earlier in the morning and stayed mostly cloudy and overcast for the two-hour party. I was pretty bummed because I had loads of decor for the backyard that I didn't want to put out due to rain. And our umbrella would have fit with the theme! But alas, no sun to block.

I designed the invite, nothing too fancy.
You can see in the mirror the rain drop garland on the window. 

Snowflakes hanging, I quick drew clouds on the table.
White umbrella hanging up was one of the favors (kids/parents got to decorate them)

Random treat assortment: white meringue "clouds", sunflower seeds, skittles, lemon "sun" drops, lollipops, snowballs (yogurt raisins), yogurt stars, and gummy bears (they are rainbowy but mostly I just really wanted a gummy bear) 

The favor bags included sunglasses, rainbow star stickers, fruit snacks, and baggies of rainbow trix. The umbrellas did not fit in the bags!

The photo in the frame is Eli at the kids museum weather map!
Also, most all the bibs were used!

I planted some rainbow flowers, one of my favorite touches. 

This was supposed to be helium filled balloons displayed in a cool rainbow pattern. But it wasn't worth the cost. Silly streamers would just have to do. 

I love this yellow cloud shaped napkin holder from IKEA I found for less than  $2!
And the cute napkins are from there too. I heart IKEA.

The cupcakes turned out cute and were quite easy!
Boxed cupcakes, buttercream almond frosting, weird sour candies... wha-lah!

Of course, rainbow fruit kabobs! 

And rainbow veggies, too! With dill dip. 

Remember Eli's "1" from last year? Well, I guess it's a tradition now. Greg calls it a shrine.
Also, you can see the "sun chips" and rainbow chips-n-dip (blue chips with cowboy caviar).

Our main food was SLUSHburgers which is what we grew up calling Sloppy Joes. It was the best  weather-like named food that we could think of that was good for a crowd. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs was going to be served... but that didn't seem very easy to do for a crowd. No photos of the slushburgers because well, they are not pretty. We also had a pasta/coleslaw salad that was white and fluffy like a cloud. 

It's easy to find sun-themed drinks. Sun (un)sweet tea, capri suns, Sunkist...

Bam! I also had every color of the rainbow Powerade that I considered freezing into rainbow ice cubes.  I didn't. 

This is the "cloud jello" I forgot to put out on the table! 

I got a huge stack of books from the library on weather for the kids to read... but they stayed on the table for decoration!

We had a snowball fight! The older kids got into throwing them around... and cute Chloe just chomped right down since they were, indeed, marshmallows.

Some things that didn't happen that I wanted to included:

1. Snow cones. We had a little hand crank deal we could have used, but Greg's trip to Sonic to get ice that morning didn't happen and who wants to crank out twenty snow cones? I almost bought a machine on Amazon... but really, that I couldn't justify.

2. For the older kids I had a 'make it rain' activity with shaving cream and water and food coloring and the younger kids I had food coloring and oil and water in a baggie to make clouds activity... but I just didn't have the energy to explain and do these the day of... plus my tester baggie started to leak.

3. We had the amp out with music playing and gave the kids music toys to just dance around silly, which was good for the age group of kiddos we had. But I wanted it to be more like a goofy rain dance and have homemade rain sticks for them.

4. I was most excited about the thunder game... bubble wrap on cardboard shaped as clouds... the kids would stomp on it and cause it to thunder. Earlier in the week I made my first cloud and was quite disappointed when I couldn't get it to "thunder" when stomping on it. I figured out you need the really big bubble wrap and didn't have time to get enough to make these right. Also, probably better for a bit older crowd anyway.

There were other ideas pinned and thought of mid-shower that didn't happen but overall, everything turned out well, tasted good and fun was had!

Thanks to our friends for the help and for Greg letting me go crazy yet again! I hope when Eli sees photos of this party years from now, he will know he is loved and he had fun!

-Heather

PS Soon I'll post the hilarious group kid shot... my ideals meet reality.