Lexi's 1st Birthday, Part 2 - The Prep

So, it's probably a very good thing that I started working on the decorations for Lexi's birthday like a month ahead of time because it is going to take me that long to get everything done at my pace! That's ok though, because I enjoy the "craftiness" of it all. =) Well, ok ... maybe not the tissue paper balls, they are proving to be a major pain in the you-know-what!!

(Shout out to Steph Smith for showing me how to make these!)

The pinwheels came out really cute, except that I used pipe cleaner as the "stems" in an attempt to avoid thumb tack .... The tacks just seemed like an obvious no-no for a 1-year-old's party. =/ Anyways, the pipe cleaners cause the pinwheels to stand up less than straight, but I am working on a solution.

The invitations actually turned out adorably! Unfortunately, the downside to this DIY idea was rooted in the very inspiration for them! I thought it would be cheaper to create some myself, but when I went to print them, they ended up costing about $1.50 each .. not terrible, but certainly not my brilliant "money-saving" plan.

(Note: I copied the idea from a genius fellow blogger ... who I unfortunately cannot remember how to find her blog to give credit)

My Dollar Store candy jars (aka: apothecary jars) were a resounding success! Hopefully the hot glue will hold for the party, I will probably go find the rumored 'glass glue' at a later time to ensure that they stay this cute and put together haha!

So, I am getting closer to being done with the decorations and, although there are moments I hate this DIY outlook on throwing a party, it really is a whole lot of fun =)

A Very Birthday Shoot

In honor of my daughter's upcoming 1st birthday (yay!) I have been wanting to do a birthday-themed photo shoot with her for a while now. I couldn't decide on what to do (all my ideas involved too many time-consuming, or money-consuming details, wonderful as they were) and so yesterday when the nice man at the Verizon store gave Lexi a red balloon that is nearly as big as she is, lightning hit! This would be a perfect prop for a low-key birthday photo shoot!

And although I did not have time to go buy her a new outfit for the occasion (ok, I really didn't need to but any excuse to buy little girl clothes is good enough for me), I put together pieces from about 5 different outfits to create a one-of-a-kind, very-girly look for my princess ...

It might not have been the most absolutely perfect circumstances (I had no one to help me make her smile, which, while holding a camera steady is difficult for me to do), it might have been a park with nearly dead grass, and we might have ended up with some eye and nose crusties in some pics (gives them character really =) ... but I absolutely adore the way that her little self came out in them!

So happy early birthday to my baby! 

Lexi's 1st Birthday, Part 1 - The Plan

As I was driving around town today, I heard them discussing the after-Christmas blues that inevitably start creeping up after the whole holiday wonderful-ness tapers off ... They wanted to know what people do to help ease the after-Christmas blues (which I think is a made-up thing, I don't remember ever suffering from such a thing ... It may have something to do with my birthday being 6 days after Christmas tho, hmmm...)

Anyways, having just come from the Dollar Tree where I dropped a whopping $37 on "stuff" for Lexi's birthday party, I decided that the best way to beat these so-called blues is by having your baby's first birthday party to plan in January, it's working for me! =)

I won't lie, I have been scouring the web, magazines, pinterest, any site I can find related to "baby girl first birthday party ideas" in search of the perfect theme. I have come across ideas like owls, john deere and of course, princesses. But each idea I found just wasn't quite right. Some had obvious flaws in my eyes (I mean, who really throws their baby girl a pink John Deere themed party anyways??) ...

The owl theme was witty (sayings like "look whoooo's 1" and "owl be 1") but, maybe it's just me, when I think of owl, I associate them with the oldest and wisest characters in a Disney movie... Just doesn't scream 1-year-old baby to me ...

Then there is the princess theme. As much as I absolutely LOVE all things sparkly, it just seems so cliche to do a princess party. (I'm not gonna lie though, there will be a tutu for my little princess at her party regardless...)

 

So, what to do? 

Finally, in a burst of pure genius, I got it ... who needs a real theme? Ok, granted maybe that isn't genius, but I did decided to just go with random shades of pink as my "theme" ... I even have a name for it, "Pretty in Pink" so I guess that makes it an official theme. =)

After coming to this conclusion (some might argue that it should not have taken me weeks to stumble upon this idea, however to those people I say, it was still totally worth the searching because I love planning things like this =) I started searching for "pink" ideas. It has been a gold mine (or rather, a "pink" mine ... ok, too corny) of ideas and I can't wait to put them all to use! Things like giant pink marshmallows and strawberry wafer crackers for the tiny guests (really, it's perfect) and hot-gluing glass candlestick holders to glass jars to make apothecary jars ... for $2!

Here are a few of my inspirations ....

So excited! I will be sure to take pictures of my crafty endeavors and keep you posted in Part 2 

(coming soon ... relatively speaking =P)

My Attempt at Joining the Blogging World

Hello!

This is my first attempt at writing a blog ... I guess you could say I'm not entirely sure what I'm doing, but I've seen so many cute blogs and ideas and things that spark my creative ambitions that I feel I need a place to share! So please feel free to send ideas and pictures my way, I would love more ideas!

So until the next time,

Noel