Hadley's 3rd Birthday

Seventy degrees for a birthday party, in mid-November, is picture perfect for sure.  Hadley has been about all things Dora for quite some time.  Typically, I am not a fan of commercialized party themes.  However, I decided to have a good attitude and do the best I could to not see Dora's face every time I turned around, while still celebrating the cute explorer herself.  Honestly, the fact that Hadley was beside her soon-to-be three year old self with excitement made party planning so.much.fun. 

Everything started with her outfit (of course).  I didn't want a monogrammed t-shirt with Dora's head on it.  I realized that Hadley had an outfit with a monkey on it and decided to let that "symbolize" Boots.  The outfit was hot pink, orange, and brown so VOILA! the party colors were born.  That really made party planning a breeze from there. 

The teacher in me loves a good theme so we had Mexican finger foods in honor of Dora.  The adults had the option of taco soup, if they so desired. 

I was able to use the last of my beautiful hot pink knock-out roses to decorate in a few places.

My favorite part of the party planning was the adventure the kiddos would go on.  I got them orange backpacks and put a whistle, maraca, magnifying glass, and flashlight inside (gotta love Mighty Dollar).  We followed our map to the different stations and used one of the items from our backpacks each time.  At Creature Crossing, kids used their maracas to scare away the creatures while staying on the lilypads and not falling in the water. 

 Sand Trap Lake required whistles to scare away some varmits so that we could save the baby turtles buried in the sand. 

At Puzzle Point we used our magnifying glasses to put a puzzle together (poster sized coloring page of Dora and Boots mounted on foam board).

 

Rainbow Tunnel required a flashlight to help us see as we crawled through the boxes. 

 Finally, at Lollipop Forest, we picked up dum-dum suckers by the handfuls (thanks to  recent 50% off Halloween candy). 

After our adventure, we had cupcakes, cookies, and milk.  I had asked the lunch ladies, at school, if I could purchase strawberry (pink) and chocolate (brown) milk from the lunchroom.  For party favors, I bought orange and pink cups from the Dollar Store and put Dora snacks, a silly straw, bubbles, and either a Dora or Diego wallet.  A few kids stuck their maps in their wallets, which was cute. 

We had a wonderfully wild time celebrating with Hadley the Explorer!  Happy Birthday sweet girl!