We made it through year one. No serious injuries, no serious sickness, only busted her lip a few times, fell off the couch and bed a couple times, multiple bruises, and I only let her eat a clump of dirt once. We. Survived. It. Hallelujah.
To celebrate the big day, we threw a blue and pink birthday party. As much as I may or may not love the Care Bears and Strawberry Shortcake theme ideas, we went for a more stylish approach to the party: Blue & Pink.
With the exception of running out of gas for the grill and setting off the smoke alarm (luckily Grandma rigged it with a plastic bag), the party went great! But hey, at least we can tell her a funny story about her 1st birthday.
This post contains affiliate links for your shopping convenience. Click here to read my full disclosure policy.
If you remember my birthday party inspiration board, you know I used a lot of ideas from Jamie at Better with Age and April at House by Hoff.
I loved Jamie’s cake for her little girl with all the sprinkles. I ended up not using the recipe she did, but still going for the sprinkle effect on top. I read that recipe and totally knew I was not a good enough baker to pull it off. She also put really cute sprinkles around the bottom of her cake, but once more, I am not very good at icing (Thank God my amazing mother-in-law was here to salvage the cake), so I opted to not attempt the sprinkles around the bottom.
To top the cake off, I made the happy birthday banner for it.
The kid got her very own cake served on a silver platter. Spoiled much? Grunt Labor iced it because at that point in the day, I was done icing cakes and cupcakes and in desperate need of alcohol. These birthday parties are BEASTS! My hat is off to all you folks with multiple kids!
We also served cupcakes. I did use the same recipe Jamie did for her cupcakes, which can be found here.
The white cupcake pedestals were thrifted finds I put together for less than $3 each. I’ll show you how to do those here.
I completely stole the idea for the balloon cupcake toppers from April. She made flowers for her cupcake toppers and shows you how to make them here. I made the tissue paper flowers, similar to the ones April also made. They were very easy to make, a lot like my tissue paper pom-poms, just on a smaller scale.
We served pink lemonade and had some blue and pink striped straws for extra flair and decor.
The backdrop is made from tablecloths – super easy, I’ll show you how to make it here – and I made the banner out of scrapbook paper – I’ll show you how to do that here! I threw together some of the tissue paper pom-poms to hang from the ceiling.
I decorated both chalkboards with birthday themes and the best chalkboard writing skills I could muster.
While scouring through the attic a couple months back, I found this Happy Birthday musical thing-a-ma-bob that was my Dad’s. I thought it fit perfectly with the theme, so I set it out as a little vintage touch. Sorry, Dad, I’m sure the “vintage” description makes you feel old.
I took an old barn door from my great grandfather’s farm and made a picture collage in the shape of a 1 to greet guests as they entered. See the full barn door tutorial here.
Remember the super cute DIY party hat I made? That is how that turned out…
See all my DIY party decorations and ideas here.
You know you don’t wanna miss any of this crazy.
Leave a Reply