cat party! part two

On the morning of my daughter's cat party, she carefully hung gift bags up by the mantel as we cleaned and decorated the house. It's become a bit of a tradition. Guests always enjoy arriving and instantly seeing that something special is waiting for them. I used bits of fabric from one of my overflowing scrap buckets.  I sort my scraps by size and color. This makes it easy when I have a specific project in mind. Each bag is white, but not exactly matching. I carved a party cat, stamped it on the front, and added a quick drawstring with twill tape. On the back of each tag was the recipient's name. As you may have noticed, there was no real color scheme to the party- we used what he had. Fabric stamping ink in dusty purple- sure. Lots of extra twill tape in yellow- yup. Matching dishes and cups- nope.Various bunting and garlands from previous years- hang them up. It was eclectic. It was just right!

Back to the bags... they were empty- waiting to be filled with piñata prizes and little gray cats. I whipped these up the night before. Just gray paint, a sharpie, wool scraps and a glue gun. In retrospect, this might have been a fun craft for the children to make by themselves with me as the master gluer. Next year...

Do you ever get an idea in your head and can't stop thinking about it? That's how it was for my daughter and pin stick the hat on the cat. Poor girl, we didn't get to it until the morning of. But it ended up being fantastic to give her a focus for all that excited pre-party energy.She channeled it right into this sweet kitty!

We sketched the body together and then she painted it. I did a little outlining, but she truly created almost all of it and was so proud to show it off when her friends arrived.

 The hat is just a piece of cardboard with paper pasted on one side.Those eyelashes... my favorite part!

A donut of Duct tape is on the other side and stayed sticky for several rounds of playing. "Around and around goes the cat... then she stops just like THAT!" I chanted as I slowly turned each child in circles before pointing them in the right direction.

Other party details:

•  there was fishing for cat food (construction paper fish and paperclips) with magnetic fishing poles (dowels, string, and magnets)
• they made bagel cat faces
• chocolate cupcakes were served with all the fixings for more cat faces
• although there were other activities in the queue, masks invite dramatic play. Making sure there was plenty of time left for that was important, too.
• a piñata! That post will have to wait one more day, because I have some work I must get to and off I go... 

Thanks for coming to the party with us!