JungleFresh Jungle Book Movie Party

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Disney’s Jungle Book Blu-Ray/Combo Diamond Edition DVD is now in stores, so to celebrate we had a fun–or should I say WILD–movie party with our cousins this weekend. Of course, I don’t do low-key really well, but we put this together in just a couple of hours so it’s pretty doable. With all of the sweets we’ve had lately, the focus of this celebration was #JungleFresh healthier foods for the kids (and big kids) to enjoy.

We shopped for everything for our party at Walmart. The Jungle Book DVD  had its own big display near the electronics section. The diamond edition set is also available with a lunch box only at Walmart, but those were sold-out at my local store. I was happy to find a variety of tropical fruits in the produce section at Walmart to help turn our home into a jungle escape Baloo would be proud of.

I used some party decorations we had left-over from other tropical parties of the past, and added to them with the fruit and some simple decorations made from supplies we purchased at Walmart. I’ll tell you about the decorations first, and share all of my recipes at the end.

I had the grass skirt and plastic table cloth backdrops on hand, but we created all of the vines by simply buying an inexpensive roll of masking paper (about $3.00 in the paint section of Walmart), cutting it into varying lengths and twisting. We clipped a few green leaves on the ends to make them a little more jungle-like. I had to get Baloo’s motto in there, so I wrote “Look for the Bare Necessities” on a banner of register tape and attached it to a couple of vines.

Of course, the pies de resistance is the pineapple palm tree. It was one of the reasons BSB broke out the power tools for this event. We used a wooden base and dowel to make a stand to support the tree. I chopped off the tops of two of the three pineapples and leveled the bottoms of all three. I’m sure you could use a kitchen tool to make a hole in the center of the pineapple, but what is the fun in that? BSB had the holes drilled in no time! We stacked the three together. I used wooden skewers to attach the two tops that had been cut off to the sides of the intact pineapple. If I had had more fake leaves on hand, I might have added those for more of a tree look.

The other favorite were these coconut cups we created for serving coconut-lime smoothies (recipe at the end).

There are lots of ways you can read about online to crack open a coconut, but where were were trying to preserve the shells for cups, BSB opted to use his tools again. First, he drilled two holes where the black indentations naturally occur in the coconut–one for pouring and one for venting. After draining the coconut milk (reserve for later), he used a handsaw to cut off the top third of the coconut shell. Our knives weren’t cutting it–literally. (Get it?)

We served our goodies on animal-shaped plates with animal print napkins.

We served a couple of familiar items–with a little twist–and a few new things for the kids to try.

I’m sure you’ve all had ants on a log, but these logs also have a little Baloo (Teddy Graham) getting ready to eat the ants.

Of course, we had to serve tropical fruits. We arranged kiwi, mango, bananas, and melon on skewers, and served them with Baloo’s Honey-Just-For-Me Fruit Dip. It is really easy and quick to throw together.

My oldest had the idea of getting the artichoke. I’m not sure how tropical it is, but eating leaves seemed like a jungle thing to do. I’m not sure if the little ones love it, but they tried it, and the big kids thought it was delicious and very fun to eat! Here’s how you make it.

My son was SOO excited to finally get to drink his Coconut Lime smoothie out of a coconut. They loved this refreshing treat!

We had a great time sharing the Jungle Book with our cousins! (Do you like the heart-attacked TV left-over from Valentines Day?). Remember you can get your Blu-Ray/Combo Diamond Edition of Disney’s The Jungle Book at Walmart now! Don’t you want to have a wild party, too?