It's Mario Time! Party Details on a Budget!

I wasn't sure about planning a party for Eli's birthday this year. I am just going to throw that out there for honesty sake. I have had a lot on my plate & I just wasn't sure I had it in me to plan another party right now.

...then the voices in my head kept saying..."But he's going to be five this year. FIVE." And to me, 5 is one of those major birthdays. I don't really know why. But 1, 5, 10, 13, 16, & 18 seem like milestones in my mind. So I just couldn't overlook his special day, despite the crazy busy weekend we already had planned for that weekend.

So, I started thinking of a theme. I had been thinking about colors. I had seen a lot in cyberspace regarding beautiful rainbow parties centered around the full spectrum of colors. It seemed simple enough. But then my mind starting saying, "but that seems a little juvenile & maybe girlie?" (...hint to Rebecca: we MUST do that for SB at some point!)

Well, Eli is way into Wii, specifically Mario! So I started searching for ideas for that & "pinning" ideas to Pinterest like crazy! The thing was though, that I really needed it to be simple, but still revolving around a theme that was do-able on a tight budget & tight schedule since I was working 2 other parties in the very same weekend. So, Mario it was, but I had to reign myself in because there were some amazing ideas out there! How did I keep the cost down? I used a lot of images straight from a google image search & planned most of the party around those. (I love Google image searches!) Here is the invitation that i edited in Picnik to add the text to a basic Mario image from Google.

I knew I wanted to make cupcake toppers & you can find some really cute ones on etsy for cheap (like $3-$6 for a printable file) but I was still going to have to print them, cut out scallops of some sort on the cricut & put them together. So i just figured out how to make my own using round sticker labels. I think, i THINK, that these are leftover labels we used for my wedding favors 10 years ago! See why it pays to hang onto things? My mom just gave me a box of printables like these (& including these) from her office several months ago that she was purging! Score!

I found what I considered to be a more "boy looking scallop" for the backs of the toppers & just cut them with the cricut & slapped the label on top! Voila! Cupcake toppers! Cost: FREE! I had all the supplies on hand...including the sticks!

Of course, Eli had a few opinions on what the cast of characters was going to be. I really just wanted Mario & Luigi. But he insisted on Bowser (the mean ugly dude), and if we were going to add that guy, then I decided to add Princess Peach for the girls in attendance and Yoshi because he is just cute! :)

While I was printing up labels for the cupcake toppers, I went ahead & printed up an extra sheet of just Mario & Luigi. And they came in handy as part of the favor bags....

What was in the Mario bags? Well, some cute stuff!

Chocolate Gold Coins! Because there are a LOT of coins in Mario land! Cost: $4 for the gold coins (I had the bags & stickers!) I added 2 coins to each goodie bag along with a few other goodies like homemade coloring books (also straight from Google Image search!) Cost- FREE again!

And thank you to Kellogg's for your Mario Fruit Snacks! :) Cost $1.50!

Now this next project is my favorite of all the details! I did have to order a mold on Amazon for $2, plus shipping (so $5 total) but it was well worth it! :) What do you get when you take an amazingly cute mold & add some melted chocolate & lollipop sticks?

You get some awesome mustache chocolate pops! How cute are these?!

I couldn't resist adding in some mustache details since Mario & Luigi have very large mustaches!

And to top that off: I went into Michael's to look for a red hat to make a Mario hat. I was thinking that I would make one & have the kids all take a picture wearing it along with a stick-on mustache. I got in there & the hat rang up for only .79c!! I immediately went back & got one for all the kids & made them all Mario hats! Whoop! Proof of the cuteness:

So the grand total for detail supplies was.....22.00 not including paper products (which I scored at the Dollar Tree!) & food. So I am pretty proud of myself for the low cost birthday this year! :)

And here are a LOT of other pictures to capture his special day:

We started a few new traditions:

1) the birthday wreath that I already blogged about..

2) I got a free printable from here that I am going to display every birthday too!

3) Waking up to balloons in your room totaling the age you are. In the balloons is a dollar bill. So Eli woke to 5 ballons in his room & earned an instant $5! He was so excited when he saw them. He said, "Uh, mommy? There's balloons in my room!"

I had a bunch more to share from my friend Kim, but stupid blogger won't let me upload them for some reason! Keeps saying "bad request." Maybe because it is on a disk? I don't know! I am quite frustrated so I am giving up for now!! :) I have officially wasted several hours trying!