Angry Birds-day Party!

 Naomi's my name & cake makin' is my game!	Cake. It’s the most important part of the party – at least to my son anyway. He had very high expectations and I think that I delivered! I baked (1) 9 x 13 cake for the base. First piece of advice - bake your cakes in advance and freeze. Mine were prepared a couple weeks before! The cake frosts best when frozen, less pesky crumbs and something you can cross off your list before party mania hits!
	Assembling the cake started 2 days in advance of the party– I knew it might be a doozy! When I had the chocolate buttercream frosting whipped up and the marshmallow fondant prepared, I got the cake out and went to town. I first applied the layer of chocolate frosting, then top it off with a rollout of the green fondant. This is my favorite fondant recipe – EASY PEAZY LEMON SQEEZY.
	Then the real work began. I made a pan of rice krispy bars. I swear those things are the only treat that NEVER turn out – hard as a rock. Thankfully, this worked in my favor, because the form of the 8 characters, pig hill, sticks, and sling shot that I made held well! A recipe of quick pour chocolate frosting coated the hill, sticks and slingshot. I colored and applied fondant to each of the characters, carefully molding each feature according to photos I found on the internet. No lie, this took a good 4 hours… doesn’t help I’m a raging perfectionist either. When all the pieces were assembled and dried, everything was placed on top of the cake. And the messy bottom edges were hidden with milk duds.
	Cupcakes. Nothing fancy here. Just regular chocolate cupcakes with frosting. What made them special were the Angry Bird toppers. They were pictures that I printed, and ever so carefully and sterily covered with contact paper and cut out. Prize Punch Box. We played pin-the-beak on the bird and musical chairs to the Angry Bird theme song. The winners (and everyone was a winner :) picked a hole to punch through for a prize on the other side. For starting out as an appliance box and tissue paper, it was a BIG hit. Stop back for a tutorial to construct one yourself!
	Pin-the-beak on the Angry bird. For this I simply found a large image of an Angry Bird on the internet, copy/pasted it into an 11x17 document, printed it, and covered it with contact paper. I did basically the same thing with the beak and added names of all the children attending the party. Fun-tac made the beak stick.
	Balloons. Purchased white, green, blue, red and yellow helium balloons from the Dollar Store. I printed Angry Bird faces from a website with free templates, then cut out, and taped the pieces to the balloon – kind of like putting together Mr. Potato head.
	Balloon Weights The birthday boy colored white lunch bags green. I cut out some smaller pig faces, and together we glued them to the bag. We added rocks to the inside of the bag, and stapled the balloon ribbon inside. Cheap and fun.
	Play masksThese were a custom creation I made the patterns for. Not too difficult since they all used felt (just different colors) and same base shape. It was just the features (beak, eyes, hair, etc.) that had to be customized for each. Sewed in a piece of elastic so it would fit just about anyone’s head. It’s been 4 months since the birthday and my son STILL wears it. Note to self: masks are a hit and have a long play life.