ParDIY

Wednesday, August 21, 2013

On The Night You Were Born Party {Part 2}

On the Night You Were Born Party {Part 1}

McKinley, my youngest son's birthday was coming up. Originally I had planned on doing a Neverland themed party. So for a few months, I was looking for ideas for that. But over those few months, McKinley and I started a bedtime tradition of reading his favorite book every night. The book . . .

On The Night You Were Born by Nancy Tillman

We read that book out! Seriously. I know it by heart and have even been known to make up songs using the words of the book as the lyrics. So after some reconsidering, I changed his party theme. (Surprise, Surprise)

So I started my planning process over again. But this time, I didn't have as much luck finding inspiration online from other parties. I was baffled, that being such a popular book that there wasn't really anything out there! I thought for sure there would be at least a baby shower or a first birthday that had used this theme.

What I did at this point was use the book and the artwork for inspiration. Now, the artwork is gorgeous! Like seriously, someone needs to buy the book, rip out the pages and frame them in a baby's room gorgeous! [I can't believe I didn't think of that] So it was fairly easy to find inspiration.

Here are some photos I snapped as I was setting everything up . . .

Fabric Backdrop - Joann Fabrics (Lucky it looked just like the night sky in the book)

Gold Letters - Cut outs with Cricket

Moon - DIY using tissue paper, Elmers Glue and Water

Table Cloth - White King Sized Sheet

White Fur Table Clothe - Joann Fabrics

Paper Plates/napkins - Target (again, lucky find that they matched the book perfectly)

Gold Cake Paper Plates - Walmart

Polar Bear Centerpiece - Scanned book and had blown up at Sam's Club Photo

Cut it out and taped it to a paper towel holder

Frog - Hobby Lobby

Crystal Glasses - MINE ; )

Gold Clock - Pier One Imports

Wooden Crate Box - Hobby Lobby (flipped over to put cake on)

Gold Tiered Server - Goodwill

Everything else I either had and don't recall where and when I purchased it. Over the years I have accumulated so much from parties and events that I am at the point now that I get to just reuse them over and over again! And I also like to use things that I already have around the house. Like the gold clock for instance . . . it was in McKinley's room. The wooden crate Box that I flipped over to put the cake on . . . that held our popcorn and napkins in our Movie Themed Basement. The white fur that resembles the snow in some of the artwork is actually used for newborn shoots in my photography business. As well as the white king size sheet!

And my rule about purchasing new things for party decor is that I HAVE to be able to use it in my everyday life! The frog that I purchased in the Spring Decor at Hobby Lobby is now in my garden!

Sunday, August 18, 2013

Cruise Ship themed dessert table

This year's theme for the Teacher Appreciation Luncheon at my sons' school was a Cruise Ship.

I was stumped! Seriously. How in the world do you decorate like a cruise ship? And after

looking all over the web for inspiration, I still had no clue.

So then I started to think . . . "What is on a cruise ship?"

•Nautical flags

•Bright blue water

•Wine/Champagne

•Well dressed crew

•Towel animals

So that gave me something to go off of at least.

I went to my local Joann Fabrics store and picked up yellow, blue, red, white and black felt.

Felt is very inexpensive and easy to work with as it doesn't fray. Following the nautical alphabet flags that I found online, I made about half the alphabet flags using nothing but scissors and hot glue. I used a white rope to hang them on!

Then at about midnight I was online watching video tutorials on how to make towel animals like they leave in your rooms. I have to say, my elephant turned out pretty darn good! I also wipped up some food label cards with two little anchors on them!

I really didn't have a plan as to what the layout of the table would be. Mainly because it was super late at night and I didn't feel like "mapping" it out. So I winged it. I just brought a whole bunch of stuff that went with a travel/cruise ship theme.

•Two globes

•Some grassy plants

•Empty Wine Bottles

•The DIY nautical flags

•Towel Elephant

•Skipper Hat ($10 at Party City)

•Fabric with a water pattern on it (Joanns)

•Left over rope from the flags

•Vintage Suitcase

•Burlap for table cover

Sunday, September 23, 2012

Prehistoric 4th Birthday

So I'm almost a month late in posting this seeing as my son's birthday party was held at the end of August and now here it is, the end of Sept. Oh well. Better late than never.

Maxim. The middle son. He is my heartbreaker, troublemaker and the attention taker.

And this year, he is obsessed with dinosaurs!

His party, honestly was one of the best parties to plan. It was pretty simple. And a lot of the things used for decorations I already had. BONUS! We held it at a local park shelter and it was perfect! The actual park equipment had a rock climbing wall and was all browns, tans, and neutrals. Yes, I am a nerd and actually DO care about what color the park is when planning a party.

I knew that I didn't want to do a "cartoony" dinosaur party. And Maxim didn't want that anyways so all was good. The only thing he was persistent on was that there would be a t-rex on the cake AND that there would be a BLUE and ORANGE color scheme. (He's a Bears fan) I could work with that.

Goody bags for the kiddos. Easy. Brown lunch bag. Fold over top. Sew zig zag stitch. Finish with label . . .
"ROAR" means Thank You in Dinosaur.

Cake and handmade cake stand {tutorial here}

The cake table! The GIANT t-rex head was hand made by myself. Funny story actually. Well, at least I think its funny. We have had this giant piece of plywood in our backyard since Maxim's birthday LAST year. I originally had it because I was going to make a big Yoshi cutout for his Yoshi Party, but surprise surprise, ended up running out of time and didn't do it. So here it sat. This big piece of wood.

My husband was going to throw it out, but I stopped him. Why waste it?
I decided to use my trusty old Jigsaw and cut out a big t-rex skeleton head. And I just LOVE how it turned out!

The floral arrangements were SO simple too. We had purchase an area rug for our bedroom and you know those big cardboard tubes that they come rolled around . . . yeah, I saved that too. I cut two smaller cylinders from it, wrapped them in burlap and some orange quilt binding I had leftover from making bunting flags and done! Add some giant banana leaves and some jungle looking plants from Hobby Lobby and you got yourself a pretty fine prehistoric floral arrangement.

The food table! We did a taco buffet. And let me just tell you, it was seriously the easiest and least costly party food we've ever done! Inside the food warmer was a pan of turkey chili enchiladas {recipe here} and shredded taco beef. We then had hard shells and soft shells for people to choose. Lettuce, cheese, cilantro, onions, salsa and sour cream. And a burlap bag of tortilla chips!

I wanted to stick with the natural look so I picked up some recycled paper plates that were neutral. As sad as it is, I didn't get them because they were "green" I got them because they went with my color scheme. But I'm very happy that they were green too! Some blue and white striped napkins, orange forks and we were good to go!

The bunting flags, I'm basically an expert at making them now. Cut some fabric triangles using pinking sheers and sew them to quilt batting. LOVE!

Ok, it's true. I even dress to match the color scheme. Yes, I know I'm a party nerd.

So as you can see it was a really great party. Kara of Bloom Photography did an amazing job at capturing the true essence of what the party was. I cannot be more happy!

Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Vintage 1st Birthday

I started planning McKinley's 1st birthday right after he was born. He was about three weeks old to be exact. I came across this blog, Young House Love.

They did a photo "quilt" with their daughter. It was amazing! {check it out here}

I NEEDED to do this with McKinley! I was too late to do a weekly one, so I opted for a monthly one.

Here's how it turned out!

Now you're probably wondering how this has anything to do with his 1st birthday. Well, really it has EVERYTHING to do with it. I planned the entire party around the colors of the fabrics used in the photo quilt. In fact, I used the actual fabric to make most of his decorations. It truly was so special!