First of Many

We are first time parents and our baby is turning one. There's been so much excitement; much like our little one the party planning keeps growing. Apart from our wedding I don't remember ever adding so many little 'extras' to a party. I wanted to share some of our experiences with other parents, feel free to comment if you any ideas what we can do next birthday.

Initially we thought to have a simple party, why make a huge deal right? As we got closer to the birthday I started thinking she's grown and learned so much in such a short time, it's definately a celebration of her life.

We are blessed with many special people close to our daughter so we opted to rent a room for the party. I am no Betty Crocker so cooking (mostly for the safety of our guests) was not an option, although my sweet Mom who actually can cook offered but we went with a caterer.

I think decorations were simple, a few balloons, a banner, paper garland, and pull string pinata. I quibbled over the need for a banner but admit it's really cute and I'm happy we got it. Then I decided I wanted to have a candy-bar to display around the cake, and a small chalkboard sign for the entrance of the room. Since the 2 tier cake will be brought out toward the end of her party my husband thought it'd be good to get cupcakes. I agreed because it will be nice to have some sweets out during the party so he ordered some (with the owl birthday theme) I can't wait to see how cute they look!

Another item I ordered from 'theroyalprincess' on Etsy was bloomers and a bib to match her party theme and colors on her dress. I'm going to attempt to make leg warmers for her in case she gets chilly, I saw a DIY from knee socks online. See link for bloomers, you can request her to personalize characters, colors the owner was very helpful.Etsy personalized bloomers

The other add on was the childrens entertainer, we saw one at our friends babies' birthday and all the kids seemed to have a great time. The one we chose is low key with a guitar and set to sing to the little ones for about 40 minutes. I haven't seen how they are with kids so can't endorse just yet but will do another blog post party.

My husband and I wanted a cake topper, another DIY project we saw was little banners online. We bought wooden meat skewers to use as posts, ribbon to attach the paper flags. I created a word document with diamond shapes and personalized it, we can print, cut, and fold the diamonds over to make the flags. See example you may want to make your own.

Under Pressure...but only from myself

I love the song Under Pressure by Queen and as my husband and I are planning our babies First Birthday party I just keep replaying the song in my head. I'm not sure why I feel so much pressure about her first birthday, it's not as if the baby will remember it. But I want it to be a good memory for all our family and friends. Our first debate was whether to have it at home or in a place, the decision was made after we wrote out the guest list. We have a lot of people to invite and wanted to make sure everyone was comfortable. The second thing we mulled over was whether to try to cook ourselves or cater the party. After doing the math we decided it'd be about the same amount of money to cater it and luckily found a hall close to home (mostly within our budget) that would accomodate. Plus having it catered will allow us to enjoy ourselves at the party. There's also the benefit of me not accidentally poison all my loved ones since cooking is not my strongest suit. :) Onto phase three, the theme!! What to do, what to do, she likes a book from Bunnies By the Bay but of course there's no decorations for that. Then I looked online and just got inundated and confused - TMI! I have a lot of ideas but in the end and with good advice decided to keep it generic and simple. I never much thought about themes for parties but from the ones I've attended it really does make a difference, especially for a kids party. I think planning the party would be worse and make me anxious if I didn't have the help of our families. Knowing that I can turn to everyone to ask for advice or their opinions is really helping me out. My sister, sister-in-law, and friends have experience with throwing kid parties so they've all been a great resource for me.