So I LOVED planning this party. I have always struggled to plan a cute party for Reed and now I know why…I am not a boy. When it comes to girly fun parties I have more ideas than I can possibly carry out. I almost wish I had waited to do this theme for her when she is a little older. I had so many ideas of fun crafts to have and paint the party guests toenails, etc. Maybe I will get lucky and Ali will love rainbow colors as much as I do and we will be able to do it again someday.
Here are the details:
1. Invitation – purchased off of Etsy. I bought her cupcake onesie from Etsy and my mom made her second onesie with the ’1′ in ruffled fabric. I love both of them so much. The only reason I even bought the cupcake one is because it was long sleeved and the party was in January.
2. Decorations. The Balloon wreath was the star of the show. I seriously LOVE this wreath. It turned out so much cuter than I had expected. I found the idea on Pinterest and then went with it. I can’t wait to pull out the birthday wreath every year in January and again in March. Other decorations were just a hurricane full of balloons, rainbow fabric on the dessert table, and punchouts of a rainbow paper to decorate the food table. I had brightly colored plates and silverware to finish out the (super easy) rainbow theme.
3. The cake. This cake was the inspiration for the whole party. I saw it on a blog and completely fell in love with it. It just makes me SO happy to look at it. I made lots of modifications to the original cake which included baking only half layers of each color. I wanted to have all the colors, but didn’t want a wedding cake for 30 guests. My second big change was to color the icing to match the cake and not frost the outside. I love that you can see all the colors of cake and icing without even cutting into it. I also made some chocolate covered oreos that I colored to match the cake. (That’s the only sweets Reed would even touch. That boy does not like sweets!)
4. Food. The food was typical Julie food. Cheese 7 cracker tray, turkey/provolone/chive cream cheese rollups, Homemade 7 layer dip, rainbow goldfish and rainbow fruit kabobs with a lime mint syrup. I tried to make kid friendly food that was dressed up a little so grown ups would enjoy it too. The party was at 3pm so I didn’t plan to serve a full dinner, just snacks.
5. Since this was a 1 year old party I didn’t mess with colored drinks. We just had soda, beer, wine and juice boxes.
6. Party favors were brightly colored sand pails filled with simple play things. I had some glow in the dark bracelets, plastic bracelets, a book, a princess wand, a tube of play doh, and a wooden car. Every little girl needs to play with cars, right?
All in all, this was one of my favorite parties ever. The mix of guests was perfect, the time of day was perfect, the weather was lovely, the birthday girl had a wonderful time playing with her friends and opening presents…and I had fun prepping. All the ingredients for a fantastic afternoon!!
-JB