Superhero third birthday party!

For Luke's birthday, I'd long imagined a "Superhero" theme. I don't know why, he doesn't even like superheros. Or know a single superhero by name. To be honest, I think it started when I sewed him a "Super Luke" cape a few months ago. I've been meaning to blog about it ever since, but I never had a photo of it I liked.

 Ug, I still don't like it! This one was taken a couple of months ago, and I suppose I should just snap a new one already. Oh well. So, I made him this cape with a big "L" in it, and he loved it. He had been having a lot of fun "flying" around the house. I thought it would be a cute idea for a party. Then I envisioned all his friends wearing their own special little capes. And my brain almost exploded with the thought of all that cuteness, and I had to make it so.

So. This is how I spent last week, leading up to the party on Sunday. 

Making eight capes!

I know that seems ambitious, but these were really so easy. I'd call them 10-minute capes.

The key was finding this fabric. It's a knit, and it doesn't curl up after it's been cut. It's a thin, cheap, polyester that was like $8 a yard a Jo-Ann. Enter a 50% off coupon and I had enough fabric to make all the capes for about $10.

Since it didn't fray, all I did was cut each cape out, and sew the top down to create a encasement for the ribbon ties. At one point, I wanted to make cotton ties, but duh, ribbon is easier! So ribbon it was. It was my first time sewing with polyester, but it wasn't as hard as I thought it might be. It's slippery and all that, but I just took it slow. I used a ballpoint needle and a stretch stitch -- first times for both.

Then I slipped the ribbons through and sewed them into place along the sides. For the letters, I printed them off my computer, and traced them backwards onto Wonder Under, which had been already fused onto the wrong side of my fabrics. After that it was as simple as cutting them out and ironing them on.

Times eight. I worked on these little by little all week and finished the last about an hour before the party started. I am such a deadline oriented task-finisher.

Speaking of last minute.... this wreath was totally that. I had started this wreath for something else, so it was already wrapped in the red fabric with the blue ribbon embellishment. About 10 minutes before guests were to arrive, I realized I had a few extra cupcake toppers and hot-glued them into place.

Yay for last minute inspiration!

The cupcake toppers I made by hand using scrapbook paper, glue, scissors and print outs of the words "L:uke!" 3!" Pow!" and Boom!" from my computer. Oh, and toothpicks. They took a while, but they made for a cute superhero cupcake display.

The cupcakes were store bought about four hours before the party when I realized there was no way in hell I'd ever get everything done, and I needed to give up the desire for homemade. $47 well spent.

The kids did a superhero craft -- they made little superhero masks. I cut the masks out of white felt, hot glued elastic on and bought an array of decorations. Fabric markers, foam stickers and little sticky gems.

I think the kids really liked this.

I liked how it occupied them for a whole 10 minutes!

Here's Luke's buddy Henry in his superhero getup. It was so cute to see the kids all dressed up. Have I said cute enough times yet in this post? Cute.

Cute? Cute!

After they were superherofied in their capes and masks, we played a superhero game -- Superhero Teddy Bear Search and Rescue! This was a ridiculous idea I had to tie a bunch of stuffed animals in our trees and tell the kids that THEY ARE IN TROUBLE! They need a superhero to rescue them!

 Here they all are, waiting to be rescued!

This was a very cute 60 seconds to watch. Cute, cute, cute. 

Last on my crafty to-do list was this shirt. Just some simple applique! I did the hand-embroidery in yellow around the outside of the blue shape. Hard to see. Cute? Yes! But not that look on his face. I don't remember why he was sad at this point, because really, the day was a blast.

Or more like.... BLAST!

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