Even More Projects

So as the birthday party approaches. The projects are in full force. Tonights project the kid tables centerpiece. What did this little thing cost me?! $1....YES! Everything else I had on hand. Just had to purchase purple straw from the Dollar Store.

How did I make it?! The caterpillar is made of scrapbooking paper with toothpicks taped behind to make it stiff. I glued a wooden dowel to the back and stuck in a piece of stryofoam from a packaged that was mailed to last month (Recycle and reuse!). I placed it in a candle holder from my sister's wedding and stuffed the purple straw all around it. FINISHED!

My Pinterest inspiration:

Yesterday me and Aiden headed up to Barnes & Noble to get Bella a small chapter book. I'm giving Eric Carle books for party favors, but since she's in 3rd grade that's not appropriate. Therefore, I went with "Junie B. Jones", seems like a really cute series.

But while I was looking for a good book Aiden was off playing. There were a couple other kids so he was having a BLAST! Then I discovered what we are giving him for Christmas next year. I know 11 months ahead, haha, but it was SO perfect that it got me excited. This past Christmas we got a few pieces of the Thomas the Train Early Engineers wooden trainset. So I want to build a table that can collapse, decorate it, and glue the pieces down.

The reason why I want to build it is because it's WAAAY cheaper!! We can do it for $30 compared to $140 for a flimsy particle board table. But that's just for the table frame, you then have to purchase a playtable top for $60. So that's $200 compared to only $30-40 top with REAL WOOD! I would never in a million years pay $200 for a table especially when you still then have to buy all the pieces... I found lots of plans online on how to do it, plus I want one where the legs will go down like a card table for storage.

Here are some examples of train tables:

I want to paint creeks, trees, roads on the top so the next important part is the design. Luckily, I didn't have to come up with this either! There are multiple sites that have 1000s of designs that tell you exactly what pieces you need. SWEEEEET! The one I want to go with is the Roundhouse Set, because it's got the piece where the trains can "sleep"/ be stored. However, ours will look a little different because I want to incorporate the pieces we got this Christmas imaged last.

So what does all this mean?! I will need to get Wes started on it sometime this summer/fall. And I will have to use my research/bargin hunting skills to the max rack up the pieces for cheap, because if anyone knows this stuff is NOT cheap since it's wood. Why is organic, natural always more expensive. UGH! But other than that I'm sooo excited!