Kenzie's Sweet 16

Sue here!

I decided to do the blog today as it was my baby's Sweet 16th. Jo and I decided to go all out for her party. Kenzie chose purple, black, and white as her theme for the party.

She also decided she wanted mini food.

We had so much fun searching Pinterest and the internet for ideas. Here is what we settled on:

There is the table full of all the little goodies. The photos below are close ups of all the yumminess!

Above is how we made wonton wrappers into mini tacos. Simply drape the wonton wrapper over a cooling rack on a cookie sheet, prop the cooling rack up on some tinfoil so the wrappers don't touch the cookie sheet, and bake at 375 until browned.

Fill the baked wrappers with some shredded turkey, sour cream, and shredded cheese. (FYI - we didn't really love the shredded turkey - I think ground beef would have been way better!)

They sure looked cute on the serving platter though.

We found some mini champagne plastic glasses at the dollar store so decided to make individual shrimp cocktails. Jo fancied up the plastic glasses by gluing some black and silver beads to the stems.

A spoonful of cocktail sauce and some shrimp made for some pretty cute shrimp cocktails.

The rainbow fruit kabobs were one of the things Kenzie fell in love with from Pinterest.

They turned out so cute. Even though it meant a bazillion trips to the store because, in our last minute panic, we grabbed the wrong fruits like a million times. Geez. They still looked cute though.

What party for teens would be complete without pizza of some sort?

These mini pepperoni pizzas were adorable... and tasty!

Individual taco dips fit my mini glass bowls perfectly. They are a layer of refried beans, layer of cream cheese mixed with taco seasoning, layer of salsa, and topped with a layer of plain sour cream and shredded cheese. They are supposed to have a layer of mashed avocado/guacamole but Kenzie doesn't like avocado/guacamole so we left it out.

The mini smokies were a big hit. We were able to buy the mini hot dog buns so Jo didn't have to make them. Which was good...I think Jo was getting a little bit tired of mini baking/cooking!

Mini turkey burgers! These were a big hit too!

Had to take a close up. They were so cute. A little mustard and a tiny pickle on top and they were delicious. The mini buns were next to the mini hot dog buns so we bought them as well!

Mini popcorn chicken. We served this with a few different dipping sauces.

So yummy!

Our famous caramel dipped green grapes. We first made these for Easter and they were a huge hit.

Kenzie knew she wanted these for her birthday as soon as she ate one at Easter time. They really are super easy and everyone loves them!

Individual servings of jalapeno popper dip. We will do a blog about this recipe on it's own a little later. This tastes exactly like a jalapeno popper.

We found some dollar store mirrors that made really cute serving platters for them.

We made these mustache straws from a Pinterest idea as well. We made black cherry juice with frozen blueberries instead of ice cubes in mason jars, topped with a cupcake liner and canning ring. The kids loved these. They are so much fun!

I fell in love with the paper poofy flowers after I made them for Valentine's Day. They are an inexpensive way to add big, bold decorations to a room.

Of course, the small things are important too. A jar full of purple suckers and a dollar store purple picture frame with a baby picture of the birthday girl make a big impact too.

One last look at the table..starting on the left side....

Now the middle.....Note the glass jars with the "K" full of colored candy.

Another inexpensive way to spruce up a table. Dollar store glass containers with a little colored ribbon, and some "K"s printed out on plain paper. Glue it altogether and BAM monogrammed party decorations. (There is a closer look in the very top photo of the blog)

And now the right side......

Kenzie had a great idea with the plastic forks. A sheet of stickers from the dollar store and some white plastic forks - perfect accessories for her purple theme.

I'm pretty sure she gets her genius from her mother.....

We wanted to give the kids a little thank you for coming to the party. A mini coke, a canning jar full of homemade Caramel Popcorn, and a grape sucker. All it took was a little purple ribbon and a glue gun. These looked so cute as well.

Jo pilfered the "thank you" ribbon from her work. Someone had brought in boxes of chocolate wrapped with the ribbon. Way to recycle!

There is the masterpiece. I made the layers different flavors. The bottom is Chocolate, the middle is Vanilla, and the top is Banana. (I haven't shared my banana cake recipe...yet...)

The birthday girl with her cake.

*Sniff sniff* she is growing up too fast....

We had a family birthday dinner for her a few days earlier and made a Pink Lemonade Ombre Cake.

Yes, we do enjoy our cake.....

Jo and I set up a photo booth for the party. We filled a box with fun hats, glasses, mustaches, etc... the kids had a lot of fun with this. This was another great, inexpensive, fun way to bring some laughter to the party. We found all of our props at the dollar store, or else made them out of construction paper.

I love this photo... I thought they all looked like they were having fun. I think they did.

You may have noticed the one lucky boy in amongst all those pretty girls.

That's our nephew, Nick. He turned 16 last month.

Yes...his hair is really that orange.

So that is Kenzie's sweet 16. She got her learner's permit to drive the morning of her party.

She is growing up too fast. (Which is weird because I'm not getting any older.)

*Sigh*

Check out Heatherly Loves for some great links. Don't forget Ms. enPlace as well!

Six Sister's Stuff has a ton of links too! annnnd.....Kitchen Fun with My 3 Sons and Carole's Chatter!