Friends, Romans, countrymen! Please excuse the long absence. I'll for sure cry on your collective shoulder about it sometime, but until then, let's talk about a certain milestone we recently reached.

Yeah. This chiquita is five. Five feels like we've entered the real, serious kind of parenting, that goes above and beyond just keeping the kid relatively nourished and dry. To celebrate, we did what Louisa instructed: a camp out-themed party, but with a heavy emphasis on the night sky while camping. Specifically, Lou wanted to be able to "see the universe." We gave it our best shot.

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DIY Kid's play tent for a camp out party

Last year, we had so. many. people. It was great, but chaotic. This year, we invited four of Lou's besties for a sleepover, and asked parents and siblings to hang out for dinner. We set up this homemade tent in the family room, and stashed gifts and party favors inside. This tent was actually, seriously, not jokingly, easy to make, and I'll have a tutorial Wednesday. You can see the "fishing hole" in the top corner - just a magnetic Melissa & Doug fishing set in a big clear bucket, but it was a hit. And in the bottom corner, the camp fire.

Fireplace insert for camping party insert.

I was pretty excited about the fire. I got this fireplace insert on Amazon for about $50, after waffling for a while about making my own, or maybe going for one of these dancing flame-type models. I decided that the flame models evoked nothing so much as the Olympics, and assembling the components seemed just enough of a hassle that I figured I'd just buy it. I was so, so happy with it when it came. It's ridiculously realistic for what it is (an orange light bulb and a piece of revolving tinsel, basically, that combine to create some pretty convincing light and crackling. Because it's meant as a fireplace insert, you can see the innards from the back, so we supplemented by propping real firewood against the back to hide all that. I had big dreams of making Styrofoam rocks and a "pit" (out of flannel? astroturf?) on which to situate all this, but we ran out of time. The kids didn't seem to mind - the fireplace got two thumbs up. I figure we'll drag it out for more camp play; the tents are a big hit, and I want to make play s'more kits and maybe some other fun gear.

We decided to go pretty simple and classic with the food: hot dogs, baked beans, mac n' cheese, cole slaw, chips and dip, s'mores and cake.

Those plates are made from fallen palm leaves. They looked awesome, went with the theme, and alleviated my guilt about using disposable. We composted these bad boys (and these utensils) and I'll buy them for future gatherings, for sure.

We dished out the main meal in the kitchen, and had these snacks on the credenza. I love the little touches: a homemade Camp Lou banner, birch-patterned straws and wood-grain coasters (from a friend); some gummy worms tied to craft dowels to serve as bait; flameless candles in starry tin lanterns (that I scored for $2 at an after-Christmas sale), camping signs (found here, and which could also be easily made with a little more time than we ended up with). And balloons. Lots of balloons.

DIY tent and starry night balloons. Coleman Lantern garland here.

I was feeling pretty good about the camp theme, but Lou was really stressing the need to see the universe. My sister Alex cleverly suggested we hang some starry balloons above the tent, and boom! Starry night! I failed to get a pic of it, but we also hung this super, super cool moon up. And, at the last minute, I revamped our cake from the large campfire I was planning (like this) to this little camping tableau:

Camping party-themed cake. Fire centerpiece available here.

So, the blue is supposed to be the starry night. That gray blob is supposed to be the moon. Don't worry: I won't quit my day job and try to support us all decorating cakes any time soon. But the campfire turned out well! Broken rolled wafer cookies as the logs, a piece of dried mango sliced into flames, candy rocks, and some decorative fir trees (similar). Love it! At the suggestion that it looked a lot more like a river than the sky, our friend suggested it was the reflection of the starry sky in the water. Exactly what I was going for! Also, the cake was nut-, dairy- and egg-free, and was really delicious. This was the third cake I've made for Lou's birthday this year (actual day strawberry, school party vegan vanilla, and this party chocolate chocolate) and each time, I felt like the cakes needed more frosting. So, note to self: double the frosting next time. But, two out of three cakes were vegan, and they were great! For this cake, if you're curious, I used this chocolate cake recipe, with apple cider vinegar and skipping the chocolate chips, and this (non-vegan) frosting recipe, subbing in a few tablespoons of strongly brewed coffee for the espresso powder and milk).

The food was all great (if I do say so myself), and between doing the baked beans in the crockpot and having my sister cook the baked mac n' cheese, it was all really simple, too. Of course, most important, the kids had fun.

We weren't sure how many kids would actually stay the night, and it turned out they all wanted to! One had to leave because of an appointment in the morning, but the other four (including Lou) just bunked down on the floor in sleeping bags. That seemed better than fighting over tents or cramming too many kids into the tents. The sleepover was a huge hit: lots of art projects, a dance party, and some Busy Town Mysteries to wind down on...

And woke up to do it all again, over pancakes, in the morning. Seriously, this was the sweetest, most polite group of four- and five-year-olds, with the best chemistry. They shared, they had fun, they problem solved around who would sleep next to who. They brushed their teeth. It all was great. We'd do it again in a heartbeat. Oh, and if you want cheap hours of entertainment, get those flameless candles. The kids adored them. As a parting shot, here's West, in fox suspenders and a bow tie.

Because camping formal wear. In sum, so much fun for our little five-year-old lady. She's already planning next year's party - birthdays are a big thing among the elementary set - but we (that's Bret, my sisters and I) are satisfied for now, and still have lots, and lots, and lots of clean up to do from this shindig. Thanks for bearing with me for what's going to be a tough one more month while I'm working, and check back in this week for a DIY on the tent, the party favors and a banner, and some recipes that make being a vegan not sucky. Love ya!