Birthday breakdown: Party pics!

It's the post you've been waiting for!  Or not, but it's the post I've been dying to write.  Either way, I've got party pics!


But first, let's talk decorations.  I had a specific vision for what I wanted at Sofia's birthday party.  Y'all have heard me talk about the cake nonstop here, here, here and oh yeah, here too.  Cake is important to me.  Cake is serious.  Cake is everything.  


However, decorations are just as important and I knew what I wanted.  Namely, I wanted mobiles over the gift table, aka our dining table.  I had visions!  It would be perfect!  I would SEW!  The only problem is I had plans to do lots of other things myself.  I wanted to make the favors.  The food I wanted required same-day prep.  The tables had to be arranged and dressed just so.  My hair had to be done the morning of the party so it would be cute.  I wanted to make a special birthday playlist so there would be cool music playing in the background to create the environment.  I wanted pictures of Sofia everywhere documenting how she's grown over this past year.  Oh yeah, I wanted a balloon canopy over the patio.


You might say I bit off more than I could chew.  But that wasn't going to stop me from at least trying and wrangling all the help I could get.


My parents and 5-year-old cousin arrived the Thursday before the party.  The first thing I did was put everyone to work blowing up balloons.  I could have rented a helium tank but at $300, I quickly decided that CO2 was free.  So I locked us all in the sunroom so the dog wouldn't get at them and we got to blowing up nearly 200 balloons.

 I bought these at Target.  Do not buy this brand - I'll tell you why in a minute.

The awesome thing about little kids is that you can put them to work 

and they think it's fun!

While Sofia couldn't blow them up, she had great fun crawling around 

with the balloons in her mouth.

That is, when she wasn't taunting poor Maya, who was stuck on the other

side and whined the whole time.

Between the four of us, it took less than two hours to blow up all the balloons.

I went for hot pink, light pink, blue, green, and white but the green came out 

more yellowish.  I briefly considered running out and getting more green balloons but

I was quickly vetoed.

Drew came home later that night and he talked with my dad about how to string them up in the backyard so I could have my balloon canopy.  Friday morning, Drew, my dad, and our friend Harrison got to work stringing up the balloons because they decided that it would be too much work to do it the morning of the party.  So we girls set out on our party errands while the guys stayed home to do balloons.  When we got home, I found that they'd been successful!

I didn't tell them that I wanted them in order, you know, hot pink, light pink, blue, green, white

and so on, so they just strung them up as they grabbed them.

I knew better than to say anything.

However, no sooner had they gotten them strung up than they started popping!  I guess the heat was too much and there were all these random popping noises.  We agreed that it was reminiscent of the dad shooting the birds the day of the wedding in Steel Magnolias.  But the popping balloons was the least of our worries.

You guys, my awesome balloon canopy started deflating!

By the end of the night on Friday, Every. Single. Balloon had deflated.

All 180 balloons.

I was so upset!  I had a vision for this party and my vision included a balloon canopy.  I was crushed and was convinced that the party would suck without the balloon canopy and all the guests would talk about my sucky party and how deprived my daughter was.  So do you know what my hero of a husband did?  They went out and bought 150 more balloons and they blew them all up, and strung them up again!  This time they got a different brand from Wal-mart and while they popped too, they held up for the duration of the party!

Balloons, round two.

About two hours before the party.

And that was just the balloons!  I was scrambling to finish my mobiles and I had put my dad to work cutting the strips of paper so I could sew them.  Finding spare time to sit at my sewing machine was a feat in and of itself and then trying to find something at the hardware store to weigh them down was a whole other deal.  Have you ever taken a one year old, a five year old and a grandma to run errands?  Everything becomes a production.  There is no running in and out of stores.  The word 'quickly' doesn't exist in a five year old's vocabulary.  

But, against the odds we did it and we hung the mobiles about ten minutes before people started arriving.  I actually got Amy Barry's help because I wanted her to take pictures of them and she couldn't do that while they were still laying on the table!  She and my brother were amazing and brought that part of my vision to life!

I was so happy with how they came out, we left them up for several days after the party.

Then there were the party favors.  Since it was a garden party, I had the brilliant plan to give plants to all the kids.  I had visions of the plants living forever and one day, when Sofia and her friends were all grown up, they would all have these big plants that they got at her one-year birthday party.

I bought the planters and wanted to paint each one with chalkboard paint (that I already had, thank God) and personalize each one.  Yeah, when was I supposed to find time to paint the pots, write on them and oh yeah, plant the plants?!  Once again, my hubby came to the rescue and planted them for me while I was sewing/baking/cleaning/running around after little kids.  And they came out great!

I wanted to string some mobiles over this table too so the mobiles made more sense,

 but I ran out of time.

That's pretty much the story of this party.

Everyone really liked their plants though!

I also knew I wanted pink champagne, so when World Market had bottles of fizzy alcohol

on sale for 4 bucks each, we scooped up a cartful.  I got some peach flavored ones just

for me and thoroughly enjoyed several glasses.

I was really happy with the sweets table.

Drew's dad sent his famous chocolate peanut butter cookies

since they couldn't come to the party and I wanted to make sure they 

got a place of honor.

The petit fours were a big hit too!  And I got my burlap tablecloth!

I wanted to cover the food table with burlap as well, but I didn't get enough

and I ran out of time to go buy more.  Ah well.

I wanted the food table to be fancier, but I was sending food out as the guests

were arriving so there wasn't a lot I could do.  However, I got my flower sandwiches

and veggie cups!  I even made some hummus from scratch!

Actually, everything on here was made, we didn't buy anything pre-made.

The next party will not be that way.

But soon enough, everyone had arrived at it was time to party!

We even Skyped with Grandma and Grandpa in New York!

My baby's first birthday party was underway!

Between my brother and Amy Barry, we got some great shots!

like this one

playing with friends

In a stroke of genius, Drew laid down this rug so the babies would have a spot to chill.

My hubs is so smart.

I love how her little pinkie is extended.

She was completely successful in making a fantastic mess!

Like I said, my favorite part of the party.

We have lots of these pictures because they're awesome.

I'd say the party was a success, in that we made it through alive.  Looking back, I definitely would have done more things differently.  If I were going to do so many things myself, I would have started much earlier.  It's not like I didn't know what I wanted, but I procrastinated until the last minute and that is not possible when there are so many elements.  I would have bought food, or made less of it.  I blame Pinterest for that.  There were so many things I wanted to try, so many dishes I wanted to have and I should have just chosen one or two and left it at that.  I would have made one. fricking. cake.  I'm not even saying anything else about that.

I wasn't overly stressed about the party, but I just ran out of time.  I definitely enjoyed myself and I can thank Zoloft for that.  When the party started, I was done.  No more running around, last minute stuff was either done or not, and that was that.  I enjoyed watching my baby and when everyone gathered around to sing Happy Birthday to her, I nearly started crying.  It was an awesome day.

And since this post is epically long already, I'll stop here.  But I have to tell y'all about her presents!  MY blog friends bought birthday presents for my baby!  It's amazing and heartwarming and I can't wait to tell you all about it!