I must admit – nothing seems finer than a nice, gooey, delicious fire roasted s’more.
Perhaps it was all that time at summer camp…or maybe I just don’t want to grow up.
When my darling husband built me a firepit in our tiny little city backyard I was simply elated. My very first thought? A whole new reason to have parties.
So, each year my kids invite their class over for the annual “S’morin before S’norin” party. That’s right, we have conjugated it to new “verb” status.
His is one night, hers the next. It is a mixture of creepy crafts, food fun, and of course fire roasted s’mores. But to me, besides all the sticky sweets, the entire party brings together our family, our friends and our neighbors to celebrate together. It helps us meet new classmates and their families, and is an entire evening of smiles, laughter, dancing, ghost stories, tricks and gooey marshmallow treats. It quite frankly, is my favorite weekend of the entire year.
The spooky food fun starts with treats in every ghoolish form…like these skulls a la pbj. Anyone can do these…simply take dinner rolls, slice open, fill with pb and j, then pipe chocolate icing from an icing tube or pastry bag with a small tip to make the eyes and teeth. 4 ingredients, about 10 minutes of work, and TONS of yum.
Sugar cookies, from premade all natural dough at the grocery (or better yet, your own traditional family recipe) are made into fossil fuel by simply pressing plastic bugs, spiders, skeleton rings and more into the cookies as soon as they are pulled from the oven. The kids did these all by themselves – from greasing the cookie sheet, to opening the dough, to decorating with the “fossil imprints”. Their faces were BEAMING with pride and excitement as they discovered what talented scientific skills they had! 1 grocery purchase, and hunt up a few toys around the house (washed so sparkling clean).
Spooky Skewars provide for hands-on fun during the party. I like to watch and see how many actually make it onto the skewar…I was refilling bowls of candies without any “crafting” at all yet started. This is a very easy, no prep edible activity that works great no matter what the children’s age.
What can be easier than lining up a collection of glasses right out of the kitchen cabinet (here I have them displayed ontop of a “tombstone” for a fun “tray” design detail) and filling them with bags of candy from the grocery? You can find orange, black and yellow candies in the seasonal aisle and also in the candy aisle (orange slices, black licorice bites, gummy worms, gummy bears). Can you guess which candy bowl was empty first?
Another fun food is a scary Frankenstein-cake. The kids loved these – and they are just five ingredients assembled in three easy steps.
Buy mini pumpkin muffins in the bakery/at the grocery, large marshmallows, tint whip cream green with a touch of all natural food coloring, small pretzel sticks, and black “gel” icing tubes. Ice the top of the muffin with a spoon and whip cream. Push the pretzel through the top of the marshmallow, and break off the end to make Frankenstein’s head “screws” the correct size. Place the marshmallow “head” ontop the icing, and paint the facial details with the black “gel” icing.
Being a s’mores party, I should pen at least a few sentences about the menu highlight of the night. I love to craft s’mores out of every possible type of cookie and graham. Cinnamon grahams, sugar cookies, snickerdoodles, m and m fudge, peanut butter chocolate, chocolate oatmeal, and more.
Hershey’s bars are great and all…but I prefer Reese’s on my s’more. Kit Kats, Rolos, Krackle…there is no end to the yummy combinations kids can experiment with at the s’mores bar.
A perfect campfire treat. There is just nothing like the good ‘ol childhood favorite s’more. No matter how you stack it.
To round out your holiday menu planning, no party of course is complete without customized specialty drinks – even if petite guests are in first and third grades. The theme for the punch bar this year was “Twilight” themed – as juices and ciders. It is always a hit with the ladies to sneak in a little RPatz. Don’t you agree?
Next up…the tantalizing table decor…
Debi Lilly, aperfectevent.com
