PAW Patrol / Puppy Party!

Little M&M just turned 2! His favorite TV show is currently PAW Patrol, on Nick Jr, so I chose this as his party theme. Take a peek at how we prepared, and what went on during party time!

Invitation

I created this invitation in Photoshop Elements. Then I printed and mailed them out. Please pardon the areas where I've whited out personal information!

Decorations

This sign was hanging on the door, to greet our guests as they entered. I created it in Photoshop Elements. The picture of Marshall, which I found via Google, is attached with pop dots!

We also created a big ol' fire hydrant for the bathroom door, so all of the pups knew where to go!

Nick Jr. provides the wonderful printable for this birthday banner. DONE.

They also give you a printable to create your very own Lookout, just like in the show! We set this up on the mantel, which is pretty close to our next feature. Keep scrolling, and you'll see why!

At every birthday party, I like to have a photo display of some sort. Remember the giant #3 we displayed at Honey Pot's Little Mermaid birthday party? How about the vellum frames we hung on the window for Little M&M's Hot Air Balloon party? Or the simple Elmo frame we made for a single feature photo at Honey Pot's Elmo party? I am very proud of this year's display. During the show PAW Patrol, when Ryder is giving the pups their mission, he displays some images on a big screen TV. I recreated that screen, with each of the pups' badges and Ryder himself, and put Little M&M's photos on the screen.

So while the slideshow is playing, Little M&M's picture changes, but Ryder and the badges stay the same. Love how this came out. True fans of the show can appreciate it too, so I'm glad we had a few young fans at the party.

Inspired by my niece's Daniel Tiger 2nd birthday party, my sister and I created these fan decorations with some PAW Patrol characters. Each fan required six sheets of construction paper. Super simple to do, and they look awesome.

Party Food

In addition to grown-up beverages, we offered water bottles, with labels I made in Photoshop Elements.

Here's the food table! Keep scrolling to see each item's description!

First the napkins, for which I created a simple "wipe your paws" sign. It was such a cute idea; I had to do it!

Next, the puppy chow! I included three varieties of puppy chow and served them in dog bowls from the Dollar Tree. I found tons of recipes from Something Swanky and narrowed it down to three. We chose to make lemon...

cinnamon churro...

and S'mores.

We also served "fruit kibble" and "pup-corn." I found these ideas from here, although they don't link to a blog post.

We served Tostitos with salsa and guacamole, but couldn't come up with a clever name for them!

Of course, "dogs in a blanket."

A favorite recipe, cheesy bean dip, was served with a label called "puppy slop."

And the CAKE! We found the inspiration from Just Deanna. It is two heart cakes, formed into a puppy shape with just one cut. So cute. We made one chocolate and one vanilla puppy. Here is one of them. The tongue is just made from paper.

Here's the birthday boy, blowing out his candle!

Party Activities

Nick Jr. offered a free printable game of Pin The Badge on Marshall. They offer Skye too!

It didn't seem as popular as Pin the Nose on Elmo, from Honey Pot's party, but a few kids were interested. So they played, and then we quickly moved on to the hit activity of the party!

For our craft, we did a puppy adoption, which I've seen all over Pinterest in my research. However, we added an extra element of fun by providing blank white puppies that they could decorate with fabric markers! Both come from Discount School Supply. What a hit this was!

First I made a sign to explain the craft; although, ignore the part about brads. We just tied the ribbons in a knot. This way there were no small pieces for littles to lose.

There were twelve puppies total, and I just placed them in a basket. On the right side of the shelf is just a few spools of ribbon from my scrapbooking supply. We used these for collars and leashes.

The printable for these certificates of adoption comes from Chickabug!

Even some adults wanted to partake in the craft!

Here are a few of the final products. The kids just loved them; not just to decorate, but to play with too!

Attire

I must give a shout out to this Etsy shop, The PartyBots, which created this awesome PAW Patrol shirt for Little M&M! He is in love with it! I whited out his name along the bottom, but it's personalized!

Party Favors

Here are the party favors! I made labels with each child's name and called them "Doggie Bags."

Inside each doggie bag was the following: a puppy coloring book ($1 each from Target), puppy stickers, a mini frisbee, the child's adopted and decorated puppy craft, and a treat bag with the child's favorite puppy chow from the party.

Here's a close-up of the mini-frisbee. I made a label for each that says, "Thank you for CATCHING [Little' M&M]'s party!"

Thank you for checking out my son's 2nd birthday party! It was tons of fun! Now onto planning Honey Pot's 4th! How did this come around so quickly?!

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Black and White

Little M&M is 23 months old

Black + White Zebra Craft

We started our unit with a gluing craft. The fun template comes from Kids Craft Weekly. I put dabs of glue throughout the zebra, and provided Little M&M with strips of black paper. We identified the colors and talked about how zebras have stripes.

Here is how it looked when he finished putting the strips of paper on.

When it was completely dry, I cut it out and asked him to glue it onto a black piece of paper.

Then I wrote the word "ZEBRA" out in white crayon, and had him do some letter matching. He did so well with this! I think it's time we introduce more alphabet into his tot school units!

Ta-da!

Black Playdough

We used our homemade batch of playdough with some laminated mats we made a few months ago. I created them all myself except for the dump truck mat, which I found on Pinterest and revised. Unfortunately I lost its source. If you recognize it, please let me know!

The first is a bee, where he had to practice rolling the dough to make stripes.

Adding spots to the ladybug.

Putting wheels on the car.

Loading rocks into the dump truck.

Black + White Sensory Bin and Sorting

Instead of a discovery basket this week, I created this bin for him. It is made up of lots and lots of black and white yarn, as well as three black and three white objects.

I hid the objects inside before presenting him with the bin.

He dug his hands in to explore. Then I asked him to search for the black and white objects.

And he sorted them onto black and white pieces of paper.

Some objects were a little tangled up in the yarn!

Color Review - Parking Lot

After introducing each color we like to do an activity that reviews all that we have learned so far. This week we played with one of Little M&M's favorite things: cars! I have a huge roll of brown paper that we sometimes use to draw roads, or line the holiday table with so we can decorate it before we eat. So I tore a piece off and made Little M&M a road and color-coded parking lot. I've seen a ton of these on Pinterest, so I'm not sure where the idea originated. But here is our version.

We drove the cars around, greeted one another's cars. "Hi, purple car. I'm a blue car." He could play like this for a long time. We'd drive all around the road and come back to park in the parking lot.

"Where is your green car going to park?" "Right dair!"

Black + White Night Sky Craft

We finished our unit with another craft. I gave Little M&M star stickers to place onto a white piece of paper.

Then he painted the whole thing black with a sponge brush.

This is the first painting craft that he felt the urge to complete the entire paper. Usually he dabs his brush a bit in the middle and says he's done. He must have liked the sponge brush!

Then we allowed it to dry for a bit.

I lifted each sticker just slightly, so he'd be able to pull them up. Great fine motor practice!

And when he had finished, he had a beautiful black and white night sky. "Look'at I made!"

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *