Dylan's Birthday party was a project near to our hearts. We wanted it to be memorable, fun & cute! I LOVE party planning and decorating, so I was excited for this wonderful occasion. Ryan stepped up and got serious brownie points for being so involved in the decorating, and I had a help from a few friends and family - all who I owe a big thank you to!
Here are a few bits and pieces from Dylan's First Birthday party...
My first goal when I started the planning process (four months ago...) was to find a theme. That is where Etsy stepped in. I scoured pages upon pages to find the perfect theme. I had a few contenders that we might go with in the coming years. A few of the TONS I had picked out were:
Ryan and I voted, and the theme we chose was Little Peanut! The colors were orange, green & teal which matched our house perfectly. The darling little elephant was cute and fun - perfect for a youngster. When we aren't calling Dylan by one of our random/strange nicknames {Pickle, Mister, Waybee, Munchkie Moo, Bubs, Stinky} I occasionally call him my little peanut. We both adored the elephant theme, so we went with it!
I found the coolest Etsy shop by DimplePrints. Her shop is full of adorable themed party packages. Here is the package we chose! It comes in a digital file, and you simply print and cut - ta-da! I will admit, it was a bit harder than anticipated. We both wore our fingers out cutting, slicing and rotary-ing (<---yes I am aware that is not a real word.) It was so worth it! Thank you Carli & Mike!
April stepped in to help and took a big pile with her to Edmond to work on in her spare time. So sweet - thank you doll!
Here is the banner we threw together late the night before the party! We had grand ideas that just did not work out, but I am pleased as punch with how it turned out. We hung it with the "removable" 3m hooks. Worked like a charm...until we took it down. Yes, there are big white patches on our green walls. Oh well, it was cute while it was up!
April cut out a million place cards and I stared at her apologetically as I realized I didn't need them. She immediately started spouting cute ideas about how to use them! She came up with the idea to do "Dylan's Firsts." I ran with the idea coming up with a fun way to display them, and the project was my favorite of the whole party. I went through 12 months of pictures and found my favorite "firsts" moments and printed them off. (Have I mentioned how much I LOVE our photo printer?) Then I printed up captions for the cards and laid them all out on the floor. I hung string in the kitchen windows with the clothespins that I decorated with ribbon, then paper-clipped them on the lines.
I loved the way it turned out! But mostly, I loved looking back through the year - the most wonderful year of our lives, and seeing how much Dylan had grown. There was so much love and laughter captured in those pictures!
I have an affinity for pennant banners. If it didn't appear that I was too lazy to take down the banners from all over the house, I probably would have left them up all year :) They make me happy! Thank you to Ryan for cutting a gagillion triangles to make the banners!
When I get my sewing machine...and teach myself to sew...I want to make a few cute pennant banners for Dylan's room. (Here is a cute NO-sew tutorial for those of you that are sewing challenged like myself.) (Here is an adorable DIY paper version.) (Oooh OOh and here is a mini paper bunting for a cake topper) Okay, that is enough pennant talk for now! I <3 bunting.
The tiny banners were one my favorite random projects. They were so cute and dainty. The DPrints package had a huge section of printed paper. I tried to come up with a few creative uses for it - one of which was to punch tiny elephants for confetti. I also attached a tiny elephant to the front of each invitation envelope. (Martha has an adorable line of punches that you can find at Michaels or on Amazon.) Then I used my 2" circle punch to cut out assorted prints and I folded them in half and glued them on string. So easy!
I got teal and orange polka dotted napkins at Party America and wrapped the
We had the wooden letter D from a past project, and I simply traced in onto some blue polka paper and cut & glued. The flowers all over the house were from Reasors. They have the best cheap flowers!! I found all mu bud vases from an Antique mall in BA.
The weather was a nice 81 degrees...with a heat index of about 100. It was HOT and muggy, but much to my surprise the party still trickled outside for a bit of the afternoon! For the kiddos we put out chalk, bubble wands ($1 at Walmart) and Dylan's cool Sensory Table.
We went with cuppies instead of cake, and my Mom and I stayed up until the wee hours of the night before the party whipping them up. The very first thing I made for the party were these cupcake toppers. Two cut circles (part of the package) glued over drink stir-sticks.
I love the way Dylan's cake turned out. I went back and forth between the idea of making his cake myself or purchasing one. I had a few healthy recipes lined up, but we decided to let Dylan go with the tradition of trying his first real sugar on his first birthday. Reasors had a cute tiny little fruit torte in the display case, and I asked if we could turn it into a smash cake. She had me bring in a banner from the party to match the colors, and I think they did a wonderful job!! The best part was this cutie was only $4.50...and delicious!
Ryan and I host our share of Birthdays, Thanksgivings & Christmases, so I have been eying a cupcake stand for some time now. I found this one here. I used double stick tape to decorate the tiers with ribbon.
The cupcake wraps were the hardest pieces to cut out. No punch or straight edge cutter could do these puppies, so Ryan nearly wore blisters hand cutting them all. Worth it? No, probably not...but they turned out pretty cute :) I also found this template to make your own.
Now to my favorite little bit of the party, Dylan's shirt!! I wanted to make him one, but remember...much to my chagrin I am sewing challenged. So back to Etsy I searched. I was elated to fall upon MakMayDesigns. Another seller, Jujustutus, featured one of MMD's shirts (my inspiration shirt) and I just knew she could create something adorable for Dylan. We chatted back and forth and she had me send her the Little Peanut digital file, and then she got to work searching for fabric to match. A few weeks later I excitedly ripped into the package to find this adorable creation. I loved that he had a handmade outfit created just for his big day! Thanks Becky :)
For the favors we packaged up little baggies of animal crackers and tied a ribbon around them. Simple and sweet! We also had a bowl of sunglasses for each of the little peanuts at the party.
Before I planned a single detail for Dylan's party, I dreamed up the idea to have a photobooth. I wasn't sure where or how, but I knew I wanted to try my hand at one! Dylan has brown blackout curtains in his room, and they set the backdrop for the photos.
We printed up directions...
(Inspiration for the signs that Ryan created in Photoshop!)
I found several templates online for props. I traced them on to pieces of foam paper, then cut them out and glued them on to "woodsies" (all from H.Lobby)
Prop Templates:
and here is a cute moustache Tumblr...just because it is cute!
Ryan set up his um...umbrella, thing, as well as his tripod in Dylan's crib, and we set the props on a table next to the backdrop. I put the prop sticks in a Barnum's Animal Cracker tin that I found for $1 at the Antique Mall. The pictures turned out so cute! I can't wait to post them soon!!
So there is a tiny glimpse of D's party, and all the details. We had fun putting it all together, and we are so pleased with how it all turned out!
Happy First Pickle - We LOVE you <3
Happy First Pickle - We LOVE you <3
1 comment:
OMG! How did I miss this post? I saw it in my google reader at one point but it was only pictures, so I was waiting on the rest of it! You did SUCH a fab job! I love the photobooth you set up! Did you just get a remote for your camera or how did you do it? I want to do one sometime!
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