Pink Lemonade Birthday Party July 14, 2011

At the beginning of June, I hosted a Pink Lemonade birthday party for my daughter’s fourth birthday. Her favorite colors are pink and yellow (though it seems to change on a monthly basis) and I designed the whole printable collection around that. Here are photos from the party. This collection features a photo of the birthday girl and Aubrie certainly loved seeing her face in the decorations!

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Large pom-poms

 

Door sign

 

Food-wise, we offered cheese and crackers, grilled hot dogs, star shaped fairy bread (in pink and yellow), and a huge fruit platter. What is fairy bread? Very simple… spread butter on a slice of bread then covered with sprinkles and cut into a fancy shape using a cookie cutter! Kids LOVE this! For the drinks, we of course had lemonade with huge strawberries floating inside and strawberry flavored Capri Sun. There were also bottles of water.

 

Fairy bread

 

Fruit platter

Strawberry lemonade

Water bottle wrappers

Dessert was very simple: a home-baked cake that featured strawberries and had pink and yellow layers inside. Wanna know how I made this simple cake? Check out the post here. This was decorated with the 4 inch party circle. We also had cupcakes in chocolate and vanilla. These were decorated with cupcake toppers and sprinkles! They looked very pretty and tasted delicious.

Dessert station

Cupcakes

 

Cupcake stand

 

Birthday cake

Inside of cake

 

For the party favors, I made pinwheels using yellow glitter paper and placed these inside pink goody bags. I printed labels with each child’s name on it and stuck it to the goody bag. We also had bottles of bubbles with matching labels, pink and yellow pencils, and personalized chocolate bars! I love the personalized chocolate bars. I have had these for every birthday and I keep a wrapper in a book of birthdays that I have for my daughter. It is a great keepsake because it includes her weight, height, things she enjoys doing, accomplishments, etc.

Goody bags

 

Personalized chocolate bars

 

Birthday keepsake

 

Bubbles

Birthday girl

If you like this party and want a similar one for your little girl, check out the Pink Lemonade collection available now at my Etsy store!

 

 

 

 

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Superheroes and Princesses! May 16, 2011

A couple weeks ago I was contacted by Amy. She asked me to revise the Comic Book Superhero collection that I have posted in my Etsy store to make it appropriate for her twin’s birthday party. Steven and Kaitlyn were going to be celebrating their third birthday party and the theme of their party was Superheroes and Princesses! How fun is that? To keep the flow of bright, saturated colors in the existing collection, I added a touch of hot pink. I also revised the party sign to read: Welcome Superheroes and Princesses! No Villains Allowed!

Take a look at the photos Amy sent me from the party! Everything came out looking amazing! Thank you so much for sharing.

Water wrappers

I love how Amy propped up the welcome sign in the middle of the table, against the rock candy. By the way, if you are planning on doing something similar, check out Oriental Trading. That is where she found the colorful rock candy and the superhero gummy fun packs! She also had pop rocks which looked like kryptonite!

Welcome sign

Superheroes and Princesses

In the front, you can see the custom chocolate bar wrappers- hot pink and royal blue! Isn’t it gorgeous? As party favors, Amy made all the kiddos capes with their initial on the back! I bet they came out SUPER cute (pun intended).

There are a few of the other items in the Comic Book Superhero collection.

Invitation

Personalized cupcake toppers

Starbursts

If you are planning a Superhero birthday party then check out the full collection in my Etsy store. I offer a package- everything you’ll need to throw a fabulous party- for only $45.

Collection

Collection

Tutorial: Personalized Candy Bar Wrapper April 25, 2011

Things you’ll need:

Print out wrapper*. Be sure to use bright white heavy paper

Bars of chocolate (1.55 oz)

Paper cutter

Adhesive such as a glue stick or photo tabs

Stylus (useful but not essential)

The things you'll need

*I can make personalized chocolate bar wrappers to match any of the invites in my Etsy store or I can make a design for you from scratch. You think of the theme and colors and I’ll create it! For this tutorial, I used the Sailboat wrapper.

Step 1: cut the paper on the grey line. Use a paper cutter to ensure a straight neat edge.

Cut the wrapper on grey line

Step 2: fold on the black line at the top of the illustration. Use the flat end of the stylus to sharpen the crease of the fold.

Fold on top black line

Use stylus to crease sharp crease

Step 3: fold on the bottom black line. These are the only two folds you’ll need to make. Again, use the stylus to get a nice crease.

Fold on bottom black line

Use stylus

Folded wrapper

Step 4: slip the chocolate bar behind the wrapper.

Insert bar

Insert bar to wrap

Step 5: turn the wrapper and the chocolate bar over so that you can apply adhesive to the back of the wrapper. I like to use a glue stick for this.

Turn over

Apply adhesive

Fold wrapper on itself

If you are using a glue stick then you’ll need to press very firmly for a few seconds to make sure it sticks.

Press firmly

Et voila! Cute personalized chocolate bar wrappers– the perfect party favor! These are a huge hit every time I throw a party- adults love them, as do the kids. Plus, the personalization mean that these wrappers make fabulous keepsakes. When you do these every birthday, you can create a fun way to track milestones.

Personalized chocolate bar

Custom party favor

Check out the other personalized chocolate wrappers that I have made in years past for my daughter’s birthday parties!

Pink Lemonade Party Collection! April 20, 2011

Summer is around the corner and that means parties outside! Hooray for sunshine- and pink lemonade! Here are some handmade items to help kick off your party in style. And of course, a drink recipe for the adults!

All beautiful parties start with gorgeous theme-setting invitations:

Pink lemonade invite

Pink lemonade invite

Pretty striped straws!

Pink and white straws

Serve your drinks in these cute daisy mason jars.

Daisy mason jars

Pretty yellow cupcake wrappers.

Yellow cupcake wrappers

And cupcake toppers add a sweet touch! These are digital files so you print your own. Print as many as you need.

Cupcake toppers

Mini jams for party favors for the adult. These jams are amazing and dasweetzpot make any flavor so think outside the box. Watermelon jam? Yep, they can do that!

Mini jam

Lemon felt favor bag. Fill this with candy (lemon drops anyone) for the kids!

Lemon felt bag

Chocolate covered oreos… mmmm…. delicious!

Chocolate covered oreos

An outfit for the party girl!

Yellow and pink tutu

And a special drink recipe for the grown ups…  *wink*

Sparkling punch

Prep: 5 min., Chill: 1 hr. For a sweeter finish, substitute ginger ale for club soda.

Ingredients

• 1 (12-oz.) can frozen pink lemonade concentrate, thawed
• 4 cups white cranberry juice cocktail
• 1 qt. club soda, chilled
• Garnish: fresh mint sprigs

Preparation

1. Stir together lemonade concentrate and cranberry juice cocktail in a large pitcher. Cover and chill at least 1 hour or up to 24 hours. Stir in club soda just before serving. Garnish, if desired.

Champagne Punch: Substitute 1 (750-milliliter) bottle extra-dry Champagne or sparkling wine and 1/4 cup orange liqueur for club soda; proceed with recipe as directed.

Note: For testing purposes only, we used Cointreau for orange liqueur.

Recipe from: Southern Living JUNE 2008

Sailboat Party Collection and Free Printables! April 13, 2011

As you probably know, I have been working on launching digital party invites and party supplies. I have a few collections available now at my Etsy store and I will be adding more over the next few weeks! I love digital party invites because you can print as many as you need or you can simply attach the file to an e-mail and send it out that way.

The digital party decorations are fantastic too because they are totally customized and personalized. Love the race car collection but need it for a girl? Not a problem since it is digital and I created the artwork, I can change the colors! Perfect!

For my son, Asher’s first birthday, I wanted a theme that embraced the beauty of New England and the gorgeous view we get to enjoy everyday from our home in Jamestown, Rhode Island. I wanted his invite and birthday colors to be soft and muted, like the landscape we have been seeing this winter. There’ll be plenty of other birthdays with bright, vibrant colors. For now, I get to choose his theme and the palate of his party! Here is the color board:

Sailboat collection color board

And here is the invitation!

 

Invitation

And of course, the rest of the party decorations:

Cupcake toppers

Party favor tags

Happy birthday banner: HA

Happy birthday banner: PP

Happy birthday banner: Y

Welcome door sign

Water bottle wrap

In my Etsy shop, I offer all the individual pieces. I also have the full range available– a fantastic deal at only $45. The full collection includes:

• 5” x 7” invite
• Happy Birthday banner: 5” x 5” square letter panels
• 2” party circles: thank you, anchor, age, happy birthday name
• 4” party circles: make signs and cake toppers
• 7.5” x 10” welcome party sign
• 4” x 6” thank you note cards
• 4.5” x  3.5” set of 4 blank labels
• Water bottle wraps

To celebrate the launch of the sailboat party collection, here are a couple FREE printables for you!

Candy Wrapper Party Favors April 11, 2011

Every year for my daughter’s birthday I have made personalized candy bars and these have been given out as party favors. I love these and I am going to continue the tradition with my son. His first birthday party will be coming up in a few weeks.

Here are the ones I’ve made for my darling daughter, Aubrie over the past three years. A big thank you to my friend Wendy who created the graphics for these!

1st birthday: garden ladybird

 

2nd birthday: under the sea

 

3rd birthday: Hello Kitty