We love birthday parties.  I always like to make sure my kids have a great special day without completely breaking our budget!  Last weekend my middle daughter turned 5 and she requested a Frozen birthday party

For starters, I shopped high and low looking for Frozen party supplies.  There are some on Amazon, but I found them the cheapest at my local Dollar General store and even balloons at Dollar Tree.  Score!  I decorated the table using a tablecloth I bought after Christmas this past year on clearance.  Then I started planning out party food.

We set our party time as 2-4pm so it wouldnt be meal time and we could save on that aspect of not having to feed a whole meal to her friends.  We went with a great layout of snacks.

Foods included:

• Ice Crystals (Cotton Candy Rock Candy Crystals) 
• Melted Olaf (Greek Yogurt with candy corn, mini chocolate chips, and melted chocolate in shapes of twigs)
• Snowballs (powdered doughnut holes) – forgot to grab a photo of these!
• Cheesy Snowballs (cheeseballs) 
• Olaf Cheese Sticks  
• Sven’s Carrots (baby carrots)
• Iced Pretzels (yogurt covered pretzels)
• Snowman Building Station – includes big and small marshmallows, pretzel sticks for arms, chocolate chips for eyes or buttons, and candy corn nose.

Games:

For games, we kept it simple.

• Pin the Nose on Olaf – I simply attempted to draw Olaf on poster board and drew a carrot for each kid to tape on Olaf.  The kids loved this game!  
• Race to Build a Snowman  – I separated the kids into teams and they wrapped up a member of their team in toilet paper to look like a snowman and then taped a nose on.  Fastest team wins!  
• Freeze Dance – Play Disney’s Frozen Soundtrack and then stop it periodically for the kids to “FREEZE” in place.
• Character Visit: Then we had some special guests stop by our party.  Local readers, let me know if you need their contact info.  They totally kept in character and did a fantastic job with the kids!  Plus they were very affordable! This totally made the party incredible!

For the cake, we used a Castle Wilton Cake Pan and my husband decorated it to look like Elsa’s Ice Castle.

It was a wonderful party and we stayed under budget!  I can’t find the receipts, but it was under $50 for all the food and cake and about $20 in decorations.  After paying for our special guests, we came in under $110 for a party with 12 of my daughter’s friends.  We didn’t give out goody bags, but instead let every child pick a Frozen coloring page that I printed to take home with them.  The kids were happy with that.

Is your toddler a picky eater and you’re tired of feeding them the same thing over and over again? Consider checking out these 20 toddler meal and snack ideas.

Breakfast

• Smoothies – These are the perfect breakfast food or snack ideas for any toddler. You can also make it for yourself, which is a double win.
• Fruit Filled Pancakes –If your toddler is tired of regular pancakes, try filling the pancakes with something like fruit. You can put blueberries, strawberries, or any other fruit you like. It might take some time to find out which fruit your toddler prefers though.
• Muffins- Muffins are fairly simple to make and you can make a variety of them for your toddler. Consider freezing some so you can just pull it our when you’re ready.
• Scrambled Eggs- Making eggs for your toddler is so easy, but when you scramble them you’re making it easier for them to eat. You can add cheese or veggies to the eggs, to make them even tastier.
• Fruit Filled Jello- Why not? If you can’t find anything else for your toddler to eat for breakfast, try fruit filled Jello.

Lunch 

• Butter Pasta – Does your child have a hard time eating things like sauce? Try making simple buttered pasta for them.
• Homemade Mac & Cheese + Turkey Dogs – You can make your toddler’s favorite meal a little healthier. Try making homemade mac and cheese plus using turkey dogs.
• Diced Chicken – It’s so easy to make hotdogs, but consider making diced chicken for your little one. You can stick a chicken in the crock pot and then cut up little pieces. Serve with boiled carrots and fresh fruit.
• Peanut Butter & Jelly Crackers – If your want to give your child a really easy lunch idea, then peanut butter & jelly crackers is awesome. This is one lunch idea that they will get a little messy with, but it’s worth it.
• Mini Burritos – Adults love burritos, so why wouldn’t a toddler? You can fill them with cheese and meat and zap them in the microwave or bake them in the oven.

Dinner 

Chicken Salad – Anything you can put on cracker or a slice of whole wheat bread is an awesome idea. Just make sure your chicken salad is really chopped up.

Grilled Ham & Cheese – Take some leftover ham and your toddler’s favorite cheese and make grilled ham and cheese. It’s so good and your toddler will love it. If they don’t like ham, then you can make it with turkey or whatever other meat your child likes. If they don’t like meat at all, you can leave it plain.

Spaghetti with Hotdogs – You may have seen this idea on Pinterest and it’s pure genius. Take your spaghetti noodles (uncooked) and put cut up hotdogs on the end. The spaghetti cooks with the hotdogs and everything expands and cooks together. It ends up looking really cool!

Homemade Chicken Tenders – Instead of making the chicken tenders really big, you’ll want to make them almost bite sizes. You can give your toddler a side of their favorite dipping sauce.

Chopped Salad – Toddlers can eat salad too! In fact, the more you introduce this sort of stuff to your toddler the more likely they are to like it later in life. Let them choose what veggies they put on their salad. You might have to do a little “chopping” to help the salad get into bite sized pieces.

Snack Ideas

• Yogurt Parfait (Add plain/vanilla yogurt and you get to add fruit to it as well).
• Granola bar—Make sure it’s soft enough, you can even make these yourself.
• Cut up Fruit- Slice up bananas, apples, fruits, or pears, and let your toddler dig in.
• Cheese- This is like the ultimate snack because it’s filling and fun to eat. You can even put it on little toothpicks to make it even more fun.
• Cheddar Cheese & Crackers—This one is always a hit with the kiddos.
• Apple Slices and Yogurt—Yes, this is as yummy as it sounds.
• Dried Cereal- Whatever kind of dried cereal you have in the house is perfect for a toddler snack.

All of these meal ideas are perfect for the toddler of your household. You’ll never have to worry about what to feed them again because you have this list on hand. What meal ideas would you add?

I know postings have been random this week.  We had a very busy week of VBS at our church.  I was teaching the 3 year olds, so I came home exhausted most days.  We had a great group of kids and had a ton of fun with them.  One of the days we even had a “confetti fight”.  That was hilarious!  We made a huge mess!!  All in all, it was so worth the tiredness by being able to teach sweet little kids about Jesus.

Then yesterday, I got the phone call I had been expecting that my sister in law was in labor.  We hurried to get my nephews and niece from her and found out that this labor was going much slower than her previous ones.  Finally my new nephew was born at 1:16 this morning!  It was a long night, but so worth it to see the birth of my precious new nephew.  Isn’t he so sweet?

So while my brother and his wife are at the hospital snuggling their new baby, we have had our hands full with 2 extra kids around here.  My other nephew went with his papa for the weekend.  We went to Sam’s for lunch and it was a little like a three ring circus navigating a buggy and 6 kids plus Grandma through the store.  We got so many looks and had people stop and watch us.  Several would start counting kids.  1-2-3-4-5-6.  Yep, 6 kids.  My brother’s kids blend in perfectly with mine and fit right between my kids ages, so it looked like we had been VERY busy 🙂

We are enjoying this sweet time with my nephew and niece and of course enjoying visiting the new baby.  Hope you all are having a great weekend!

Summer can wreak havoc on your food budget. The kids are home full time, there are BBQs and events and of course, vacations and food to eat on the road. With a little bit of extra work, you can save your food budget this summer with these easy tips!

How to Save Money on your Summer Food Budget

Barter with others. If you have a specific skill such as photography, offer your skills for trade for someone’s garden harvest. You would be amazed how many people are willing to barter, especially in this economy.

Grow some of your own food. If you live in an apartment or somewhere else that doesn’t really allow for gardening, check to see if your area has a community garden. A community garden allows you to buy a plot or volunteer for one and grow your own food on it. You plant it, care for it and harvest it just like if it was on your own property. Even if you have room for a garden, this can be a great way to expand your growing area.

Take advantage of great coupons and sales in the summer. The summer seems to be a great time when lots of coupons are released for food products. You can usually save big on meat, condiments and canned goods and when you do, make sure you stock up for the summer and into the autumn season.

Look for free lunches for community children. If you are on a really tight budget, you may be able to get your children free lunches at area schools through the Summer Lunch Program which is run by the USDA and local governments. Usually, the lunches are free for any school aged children and often held for a couple hours a day at several locations.

Eat a lot of cold lunches. Things like sandwich meat and bread are fairly low cost and you can do a lot with them from cold sandwiches to hot melts and even rollups and Panini’s.

Make use of leftovers. Dinners from previous nights can provide excellent leftovers for lunches and even breakfasts the next day. For instance, if you have steak one night and have leftovers, make an omelet the next day out of it.

Check out local farms in your area. Often times, before harvest, farmers allow the general public to pre-order a certain amount of pounds of their produce. If this expense is too much for you alone either in volume or in price, go in on it with a friend or two and plan to split it equally among everyone.

Ask around. You might be able to get free food this way. It may seem strange, but if you post an ad on Craigslist or join your local chapter of Freecycle and post a “looking for” ad, you can often get free food. This works best in the summer when people have harvests and may have more yield than they can reasonably use and are looking for people to give it away to.

Prepare.  If you are going on a trip, avoid a huge food budget by bringing along things like snacks, cold sandwiches, and drinks in a cooler. This will keep you from having to spend as much along the way and avoid putting your budget in the hole.

Check into Co-ops.  Our family participates with the Bountiful Baskets co-op.  It’s $15 for a huge box of fruits and veggies!  Totally worth it!

Do you have any other tips to add?  Leave a comment and let us know!

Fourth of July is probably one of my favorite holidays.  Our tradition has always been to go to the Colbert parade and then cook out afterward.  This year, my husband is working so not sure what the kids and I will still do, but I’m sure we will still be going to that parade.  It’s a great one if you’re local!

Here is a roundup of some great Fourth of July Desserts that you can prepare easily for your family or get together.
American Flag Fruit Kabobs 

Red White and Blue Fruit Puree Shooters

Watermelon Rice Krispies

Lemoncello Berry Mini Trifle

Red, White and Blue Tart

Firecracker Dipped Pretzel Rods

Patriotic Rice Krispy Treat Pops

Red, White, and Blue Trifle

Patriotic Ice Cream Cake Recipe

Red, White, and Blue Ice Cream Sandwiches

Sparkler Cupcakes

Fourth of July Poke Cake

Patriotic Cheesecake Pretzel Bites

My 3 girls share a room.  I have been looking for fun ideas to help organize their stuff, especially their stuffed animals.  I can across this Boon Animal Bag Stuffed Animal Storage and right now it’s on sale for $29.27, down from $39.99!  Looks like a great way to organize without getting rid of all the stuffed treasures.

So the other day, I told you all about how we decided to get our almost 11 year old daughter a cell phone.  She got back from the middle school youth retreat today and now I know why she didn’t answer any of my texts the past 24 hours.

Did I mention they were going to go to the lake and to a river?  Does this look familiar to anyone?

Yep.  Her new phone took a little swim.  In her defense, a friend of hers slipped and fell into the river and she fell in trying to get her friend out.  One of the chaperones ended up in the water as well and also soaked their phone.  Things happen.  I’m just very glad no one was hurt.  This is exactly why we went with an inexpensive phone for our daughter.  Now we just have to wait and see if the rice does it’s trick. If not, then we will see what our options are for replacing the phone.