Posts Tagged ‘movies’

Old-Fashioned Movie Birthday

Wednesday, November 2nd, 2016

old-fashioned-movie-cake

If you want to throw an old-fashioned movie birthday party, you have come to the right place! I will show you how to make a cake in the shape of an old movie camera. I will also tell you about some activities you can do for a movie party, besides watching a movie!

How to make an old-fashioned movie camera cake:

Let’s start with the cake. You will need to bake three cakes; the first two will be rectangle cakes, and the third will be divided between two circle pans. You will assemble the pieces this way:

movie-camera-cake-2

I trimmed the sides of the first rectangle cake for the center section of the cake. I cut the bottom and side trapezoids from the other rectangle cake. (You can eat the cake leftovers while you work!)

I wanted the circles on the top of the cake to be smaller than a cake pan, so I used a round plastic container as a cookie cutter.

cake-circle

The finished cake is at the top of this post. I found some large letter stickers at a hobby supply store, and I stuck them down on white card stock paper and taped them to toothpicks before stabbing them into the cake.

Decorations for a movie party:

home-movie-screen

You can tape curtains to the sides of your television. We used the curtains from our puppet theater, but you can just hang some cloth and tie the sides. No sewing is required. I found a movie gadget that opens and closes for the scenes being filmed. I bought it at a party supply store. We used it for the skits described in the activity below.

movie-party-decorations

I also found some Hollywood decorations at a party supply store, which I hung from the chandelier, but you could just cut out a silver star out of card stock paper. I had silver star confetti and silver streamers. I placed a black bed sheet on the table, and the silver streamers ran down the sides. A camera was placed in the middle of the table on top of the confetti.

Movie party activities:

dress-up-box

Grab a basket or dress-up box and place different hats, scarves, glasses, and other accessories into it. (We found some stick-on moustaches at a costume shop!) The kids can break into teams and practice a fun skit with the materials in the basket. Then they can present it to the audience. You can film the skits.

outdoor-movie

During the second half of the party, we watched an outdoor movie. If you don’t have a projector, you can watch the movie indoors on your television. We hung a sheet outside and used the projector from my speaking engagements, and we watched “The Princess Bride” outside. We had a great time at our old fashioned movie birthday party!

Star Wars Cake

Monday, December 14th, 2015

star-wars-cake

For my son Stephen’s 14th birthday, I made him a Star Wars cake–or to be more precise, a Darth Vader cake! I started with a simple rectangular cake. I baked it the previous day and cooled it overnight in the refrigerator.

I googled “Darth Vader” and tried to find a simple silhouette of his head so that I could cut out the shape with a knife. I cut the cake little by little until it was the perfect shape of Darth Vader’s head.

I found a piece of cardboard in the recycle bin in my garage, and I cut it slightly larger than the cake. I taped foil to the cardboard to make a base for the Darth Vader cake.

Next I grabbed the chocolate frosting. Since I didn’t want a black cake, I thought brown would be fine. I opened the frosting container and frosted the entire cake, including the sides.

Finally, I used a tube of black frosting to outline the details of Darth Vader’s face. First I outlined the outside of the cake. Then I did the forehead and eyes. Last, I did the mouth. My husband proclaimed that this Star Wars cake was one of my best cakes of all time!

princess-leia

We decorated the dining room table by throwing a dark blue sheet over it. Next we crossed two toy light sabers in the middle of the table. Last, we scattered star confetti and Star Wars paper chain links that we got at a party supply store.

While watching a movie marathon of Star Wars movies on DVD, I braided my daughter’s hair like Princess Leia. She looks so cute, don’t you think?

Dollar Movies

Thursday, July 19th, 2012

dollar-movies

The summer is a great time to go to the dollar movies, and yes, they still exist in many cities. The tickets usually cost $3.50 instead of $1, but that’s still good when you have a family of six. The movies have been out of the real theaters by the time you see them at a dollar theater, which is about two months behind.

In Spokane, the dollar movies are at the Garland Theater, which is huge and quite beautiful for an old movie theater. Yes, the floors are sticky, but who is going to complain? Oh, and every summer they show a free movie certain mornings, to help people get out of the heat. (Or to get them hooked on going to that theater so that they can stay in business throughout the year.)

dollar-movie-concession-stand

We’ve watched several movies at this theater over the years, including “Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs” and “Tangled.” It made us want to build boats out of sandwiches and float lanterns up into the sky. My kids love seeing movies on the big screen.

If you have a zero budget, another way to watch fun movies during the summer with your family is to get some entertaining DVD’s from your library. Not all the videos are educational. Some of them are just for fun, and many are recent releases. Check them out, go home, pop yourself some popcorn, and declare a movie night!

Related article: The Aftermath of a Movie