Campbell’s Blog

No, this isn’t School House Rock or an ESPN commercial. Campbell is turning three years old! We just had his birthday on Saturday and had a great time.

We were set on having a trash themed party for the little man and he was super-excited. When we went out searching for things to make the party theme at the typical supply websites, there was not a lot to see. Through some searching though there were a couple of websites that we found. Most actually read the same way as this post, saying that there isn’t much out there to guide you. We found this post at pinkpeppermintpaper.com especially helpful, and we stole some ideas. Some other ideas we borrowed and built upon. And some didn’t get used at all since she is too ambitious for us.

The day started out with Campbell discovering one of his surprises early in the day. Mom and Lisa made a shirt for him to wear with a big garbage can on the front. Luckily he found the 2nd shirt that was made, and his shirt for the actual party remained hidden. You will see that later.

Already getting busy in the morning.

The linchpin of the party was the blow up bouncer truck that we rented from a local rental shop (looked for a link, and can’t find a website). It was super cheap and super easy. They came and set it up and left it for hours and the kids loved jumping in it. We were fortunate to have wonderful weather so it wasn’t too hot for it either. It was a monster truck shape, so not exactly the right theme, but very boyish.

The other activity that we had setup was an I Stink Garbage Hunt. Through the week we collected the different items that you can find in the book
I Stink and had them thrown all over the yard. We took the kids easel and posted copies of the book pages on it so the kids could pick out what they were going to go hunt for. This one’s success was a little bit of a surprise since the kids not only did it one time, but went and did it repeatedly over and over.

Ready to find some garbage with the pickers.

Next came the birthday cake. Mom took a lot of time and a practice run to make this cake and it turned out fantastic. Campbell got free reign on this one to eat as he pleased. No, he didn’t eat the whole thing. One of the reasons he got it and we didn’t bother to plan to cut that up for everyone was the shear awkwardness of its shape, and the fact that we didn’t plan to make it big enough to have a piece for everyone. The intent was more to make the effect of it being a garbage truck. That was a success.

Yummy, yummy, yummy!!

So, since Campbell alone got all of the cake, what was there for the rest of the kids (and adults too)? Dirt cupcakes. This idea was a little bit from the dirt cups that you can get at Mimi’s Cafe from the kids menu combined with a regular old cupcake. The cupcakes were frosted as normal, but then crushed Oreos were sprinkled on top and a gummy worm stuck into the middle, popping out like out of an apple. Ewwww.

Yucky worms.

Lastly all the kids got to take home a little goodie. The hardest one was making bottlecap necklaces. Needless to say Dad made them about 3 times before the last trial of getting them about right. Still the process had something left to be desired and there has to be a better way. But, they ended up being a customized little trinket for each child and they seemed to like them. They also got to take a garbage can cup home with them which is the same cup that Campbell got to drink from at the party (not literally).

Personalized charms.

There are many more pics of the party. Since I tried to make this post with the built in WordPress media uploader, I am completely lost in how to simply link to the album. So instead, you get to see all the pictures right here. Not ideal and I hope to fix it.
Update: I went back to the old standby, Photopress, and reloaded the pictures and replaced them in this post. The built in WordPress Media Manager just wasn’t working well for me. I’m sure I’m doing something wrong.

Location of the album:
Birthday10