I would not label myself as a party planner by any means, but I wanted this to party to be just as special as she is. So I tried to summon my inner party planner to come up with something festive and fun. I have seen countless blogs with so many ideas and all of these little touches that are ridiculously adorable, and I wanted to do them all, but I had to keep things in perspective. I had to remind myself that she is only one and not going to remember this, that I am not a millionaire, and that I do not have a plethora of hours to dedicate to party planning and crafts. So once I put the party into the scope of my reality, it began to come together!
Being that her birthday is in the heart of winter and she is still a bit young to really be a fan of anything, I decided to go with a winter wonderland penguin theme, with a wintry ivory, lilac, and baby blue color scheme.
Then the obsession to find the perfect invitation and party decor began. It took quite some time before I found the invitation that fit the look I wanted, but I finally found it on a site called paperculture.com This company, while a little pricier than I initially imagined, was worth it. The invitations were perfect and the company uses recycled materials and they plant a tree with every order. You can also dedicate the tree planted from your order, so we dedicated ours to (Great) Grandma Linley.
Once invitations were checked off the list, we needed a new Cricut cartridge to make some birthday banners! I found the Create a Critter cartridge which had an adorable penguin and igloo option. They were the perfect characters for these banners and the cake:
Before I was knee deep in party planning, I came across these on Pinterest and knew I had to make them for the tables at the party. They seemed simple, inexpensive, and could be used in our house afterwards (bonus!). Of course I left them until the last minute possible the night before the party, but even still they turned out great! I hate that I did not take pictures of the process, but that's something I hope to get better at!
Then what is a party without food? This is yet another thing I left undecided until just before the party. I just could not decide what to serve! Then my mom had the great idea of soup! So, again borrowing from the expertise of Aunt Jessie, we went with the ever popular cheese tortellini soup, and every last drop of it was devoured! I also knew from the beginning stages of the planning that I wanted a hot chocolate station with marshmallows, whipped cream, sprinkles, etc. So to complement those two things we had an assortment of other finger foods and beverages including things no Linley function is complete without like chicken salad sandwiches and cheese trays, but also pinwheels, goldfish, fruit, and icy blue punch! It was a lot of food, but I think they were crowd pleasers!
Once I finally had everything planned and bought, it just needed to be executed, which seemed easy in my head, but in reality would have been pure chaos without the help of my mom and Nicole!
I am kicking myself for not getting better pics of everything. I was running around like a crazy and didn't have the sense to delegate that job, until much later. Thanks to Alicia for capturing the present action!
But it all came together just as I imagined in my head and was the perfect first birthday bash for our princess!
Stay tuned for the party in action pics!
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