I started planning Stella's first birthday party back in late December. A friend's little boy was turning 1 the middle of January and she said she hadn't planned anything. I offered my help and immediately started thinking about ideas. In some ways, I'm a huge planner and in other ways, I just wing it.
A first birthday party is a big deal. Well, I think it is. I knew it was something that I wanted to do on a budget and as free of stress as possible. I didn't want her birthday party to be overly girly. I'm not and she's not (however, her shoe fetish does seem to be growing!) I saw this adorable star themed party and considered it since Stella means "star". I will most likely do something similar for birthday party #2. While it's beautiful and oh-so cute, I feel it's too sophisticated and proper for
When I was pregnant, one thing we wanted for our little girl was to not be a super girly girl. As a child, I loved running around naked, getting dirty, playing with bugs, frogs, mice. There were days, heck probably weeks in the summer where I didn't have a proper bath because I had been swimming in the pool at my grandparents. I was a little tomboyish and that's what we want for Stella.
Her nursery is decorated with The Very Hungry Caterpillar and nature in mind. There are caterpillars and butterflies, of course, ladybugs and frogs because I love both. We threw in some floral touches also. I saw A Very Hungry Caterpillar themed parties on Pinterest, but I felt that was too limiting for me. Then I started thinking about what I call Stella. She's been given many nicknames. Sweet pea was one that started in the beginning because when we told my parents I was pregnant, the size of the baby/egg at that particular time was the size of a sweet pea. My dad called her that until we decided on the name, Stella. Actually, he still calls her that on occasion. Donald calls her Pooty Head? I also call her baby girl, sweet girl, honeybear, Stella B, squeaker (she squeaked like a toy when she had the hiccups the first few months), smelly Stelly, but Doodlebug or Doodle is one I use a lot. So then I thought, why not do a bug party? But then I decided to extend it a little further to be a Garden Bug party. It can include your typical bugs found in a garden such as caterpillars, butterflies, dragonflies, bees and ladybugs and also have frogs and flowers. By adding the ladybugs and flowers, it also makes it a little more girly than a most likely boy's bug party. With Spring approaching, I could purchase things in Jan/Feb as there are being put out and also on sale after Easter.
A perfect find for her party: yard sale onesie/dress that reads '"S" is for Snail."
I have to admit, I'm quite proud of myself. I was waaay better planned with this party than I was with our wedding almost four years ago. I think it's because of Pinterest. I'm a very visual person and looking through "Stella's 1st birthday" board and actually seeing things I've done or haven't done is so much easier for me to comprehend rather than looking over words of what I have to do. It also helps that I was so truly excited about this party.
Purchasing:
Most times came from The Dollar Tree, $5 Below and the $1 bin at Target. I filled in with Costco and Aldi.
Food:
I had a veggie platter (caterpillar food) with homemade buttermilk ranch dip, hummus pots (which were surprisingly barely touched) and ants on a log.
I wanted to do this when arranging the veggies, but a friend asked how she could help so I just told her to make a veggie platter. In the end, it doesn't matter because it was one less thing for me to do.
For a fresh and healthier dessert, I made caterpillar kabobs with grapes and a maraschino cherry head. I also wanted to make this and this because they are both adorable and oh so easy, but I ran out of time to do it and space to store this in the fridge.
I wanted to do this when arranging the veggies, but a friend asked how she could help so I just told her to make a veggie platter. In the end, it doesn't matter because it was one less thing for me to do.
For a fresh and healthier dessert, I made caterpillar kabobs with grapes and a maraschino cherry head. I also wanted to make this and this because they are both adorable and oh so easy, but I ran out of time to do it and space to store this in the fridge.
For the meat we grilled hot dogs (both beef & turkey) and BBQ chicken. We also served a smoked pork butt with those tasty Hawaiian rolls to make sliders.
I served this with that delicious poppyseed slaw mix from Costco and veggie straws. I originally wanted to do pasta salad similar to this dish with the farfalle pasta since farfalle is butterfly in Italian, but we didn't have much room left in the fridge for me to prepare and keep it cold. The veggie straws and slaw were enough. I set out relish for the dogs and homemade pickles.
I served this with that delicious poppyseed slaw mix from Costco and veggie straws. I originally wanted to do pasta salad similar to this dish with the farfalle pasta since farfalle is butterfly in Italian, but we didn't have much room left in the fridge for me to prepare and keep it cold. The veggie straws and slaw were enough. I set out relish for the dogs and homemade pickles.
I asked Wanda, Donald's mom to make dirt cake. She's been making this for years and it's always been a favorite of the boys in the family. I thought it was perfectly appropriate for a Garden Bug themed party. My mom gave me some flower suckers to put in Stella's Easter basket. I put them aside to decorate the dirt cake with. I completely forgot to take a separate picture of the dirt cake with the gummy worms and flowers, but you can see it below. It was very cold and refreshing on this warm summer day.
To make the utensil bundles, I placed a napkin (mine were printed on both sides) and stacked a knife, fork and spoon together diagonal to the napkin. Then I rolled and tied a brown ribbon (re-purposed from our wedding bubbles) around the napkin to secure the utensils. I placed them upright in a basket I already had from home.
I bought an unfinished wooden flower, bee and bird from the craft section at The Dollar Tree ($1 each) and painted them a few nights before the party. The flower got stuck in a tiny pot above. The bee made his way into a huge bowl of boiled peanuts (kinda ironic, huh?) and the bird perched in the dirt cake.
I bought 5 solar flower pots from $5 Below for $1 each and put one on the food table and the rest served as a whimsical centerpiece on the eating tables. It was fun seeing the flowers sway back and forth and the leaves bounce up and down. They are super cute, but unfortunately I don't have a single picture of one. Now, they reside in our windows of our house.
*Polka dotted tablecloth is Circo and came from Target-$5.
*Floral Plates, napkins, silverware came from Costco-$10.79 for 50 plates and 50 napkins.
*Plain yellow dessert sized plates-$1 from The Dollar Tree.
*Clear plastic cutlery-$10 from Costco (300+ pieces)
*The platters, baskets, cupcake holder, cake stand and beverage containers were mine.
To make the utensil bundles, I placed a napkin (mine were printed on both sides) and stacked a knife, fork and spoon together diagonal to the napkin. Then I rolled and tied a brown ribbon (re-purposed from our wedding bubbles) around the napkin to secure the utensils. I placed them upright in a basket I already had from home.
I bought an unfinished wooden flower, bee and bird from the craft section at The Dollar Tree ($1 each) and painted them a few nights before the party. The flower got stuck in a tiny pot above. The bee made his way into a huge bowl of boiled peanuts (kinda ironic, huh?) and the bird perched in the dirt cake.
I bought 5 solar flower pots from $5 Below for $1 each and put one on the food table and the rest served as a whimsical centerpiece on the eating tables. It was fun seeing the flowers sway back and forth and the leaves bounce up and down. They are super cute, but unfortunately I don't have a single picture of one. Now, they reside in our windows of our house.
*Polka dotted tablecloth is Circo and came from Target-$5.
*Floral Plates, napkins, silverware came from Costco-$10.79 for 50 plates and 50 napkins.
*Plain yellow dessert sized plates-$1 from The Dollar Tree.
*Clear plastic cutlery-$10 from Costco (300+ pieces)
*The platters, baskets, cupcake holder, cake stand and beverage containers were mine.
I made the cupcakes and Stella's smash cake. It's this carrot cupcake recipe here. I did not use applesauce or oil in the recipe. In place of both, I used crushed pineapple along with its juice. For the icing I used 2 sticks of softened butter, 2 blocks of softened reduced fat cream cheese, roughly 3 cups of powdered sugar, few splashes homemade vanilla extract, squeeze of lemon juice and the zest of an entire lemon. I could eat this with a spoon!
I really wanted her cake to look like this beehive cake, but instead I went with this much simpler option. I can bake almost anything, but as much as I want to be, I am not a cake decorator. Really, I think I could have pulled it off if I had used buttercream frosting instead of cream cheese. But you can't have carrot cake and not have cream cheese frosting.
These adorable butterfly cupcakes would be doable or this cake if you are somewhat of an experienced decorator (not me).
I pinned a few healthy first birthday cake ideas here and here. I say "Let them eat cake" but at least keep it healthy since it's possible they'll eat so much they get sick.
I really wanted her cake to look like this beehive cake, but instead I went with this much simpler option. I can bake almost anything, but as much as I want to be, I am not a cake decorator. Really, I think I could have pulled it off if I had used buttercream frosting instead of cream cheese. But you can't have carrot cake and not have cream cheese frosting.
These adorable butterfly cupcakes would be doable or this cake if you are somewhat of an experienced decorator (not me).
I pinned a few healthy first birthday cake ideas here and here. I say "Let them eat cake" but at least keep it healthy since it's possible they'll eat so much they get sick.
The "Happy Birthday Stella" and "I am 1" banner I made myself. I purchased a yard each of the colored felt and cut everything out. I'd been planning it for a while and it was made back at the beginning of May. My sweet sister in law, Ginger sewed the ric rac on to the birthday banner and hot glued the letters on. This banner was my inspiration. I made the banner for the highchair last minute (week of) and didn't have any ric rac left, but I did have some pink ribbon that would work just fine. All of the letters are hot glued down. The number was stuck on with doubled sided tape. That way I can change it out each year. I purchased the "Happy Birthday" seat cover from The Dollar Tree.
*Felt fabric-$6/yard at Hobby Lobby (I purchased 1/2 yard of 5 colors=$15). 1/2 yard was waay more than I needed to cut the triangles and letters, but I didn't really know how much I would need. In the words of many older, wiser people, "It's better to have it and not need it, than need it and not have it."
*Ric Rac-$1.50 for 9 yards at HL. This ended up not being enough ric rac for the length of my project, but again, I didn't know until I placed everything out. Luckily, my sister in law who sewed it together had some orange to spare.
I really wanted our guests to see how much our Doodlebug had grown in her first year. The month by month bulletin board turned out great. The board was less than $3 at Goodwill and the fabric was a leftover scrap from something my mother had made years ago. I was using it as a cover on an antique vanity. Initially, I placed all of the photos up on the bare board, but you could see the hole marks from it's previous owners. I felt that a solid background would be best, but I had this laying around and it was perfect. I didn't have to do much cutting as it was nearly the same size as the board. It is the Mary Englebrite fabric and says "Grow where you are planted". There's flowers and garden tools sprinkled in too.
I made this a kid's table to keep the littles entertained. It had bug, flower and garden themed books for the kids to flip through or read, a jar of bubbles (re-purposed from our wedding; I just took the ribbons off), a bug themed puzzle with jumbo sized pieces, butterfly nets and bug "homes". I was super excited about the tablecloth covered in flowers, butterflies, bees and ladybugs. I love how whimsical it is.
*The tablecloth fabric was purchased from IKEA and my sister in law hemmed it for me. It was $6.99
*The bug puzzle was purchased from $5 Below for $5.
*The ladybug, butterfly and bee magnifying glasses, half of the butterfly nets (the ones with the colored handles) and garden tools were all purchased from the Target $1 bin. The watering can was $3.
*The nets with the bamboo handles were purchased from The Dollar Tree.
This adorable picnic table with the ants was borrowed from my Mama. She had about 5 ants so we scattered them around on the tables.
Other ideas for the kid/game area:
*I tried finding a used Cootie game. I thought it would match the theme for the party and be fun for the kids. I saw a few of the other Hasbro games at Goodwill a time or two, but never this particular game. Since Stella herself can't actually play it right now, I didn't purchase it, but it would be perfect for an older birthday party.
*I also had The Very Hungry Caterpillar puzzles and games up in her closet, but forgot to put them out.
*This game of kiddie cornhole (essentially).
*Bug Tic-Tac-Toe with rocks and a cross section from a tree.
Pin the dots on the ladybug or pin the bugs on the frog's tongue.
*Buying butterflies or ladybugs to release at the party.
*I really wanted to do a bug dig for the kids but as I said before, the age range was all over the place. My idea: Put dirt into a wheelbarrow, empty a tub or two of real earthworms in and mix up, give kids a bucket for their "haul" and tell them to start digging. You could offer shovels or just do hands. Hands only would be messy, but it would probably lead to less severed worms in the wheelbarrow.
*The tablecloth fabric was purchased from IKEA and my sister in law hemmed it for me. It was $6.99
*The bug puzzle was purchased from $5 Below for $5.
*The ladybug, butterfly and bee magnifying glasses, half of the butterfly nets (the ones with the colored handles) and garden tools were all purchased from the Target $1 bin. The watering can was $3.
*The nets with the bamboo handles were purchased from The Dollar Tree.
This adorable picnic table with the ants was borrowed from my Mama. She had about 5 ants so we scattered them around on the tables.
Other ideas for the kid/game area:
*I tried finding a used Cootie game. I thought it would match the theme for the party and be fun for the kids. I saw a few of the other Hasbro games at Goodwill a time or two, but never this particular game. Since Stella herself can't actually play it right now, I didn't purchase it, but it would be perfect for an older birthday party.
*I also had The Very Hungry Caterpillar puzzles and games up in her closet, but forgot to put them out.
*This game of kiddie cornhole (essentially).
*Bug Tic-Tac-Toe with rocks and a cross section from a tree.
Pin the dots on the ladybug or pin the bugs on the frog's tongue.
*Buying butterflies or ladybugs to release at the party.
*I really wanted to do a bug dig for the kids but as I said before, the age range was all over the place. My idea: Put dirt into a wheelbarrow, empty a tub or two of real earthworms in and mix up, give kids a bucket for their "haul" and tell them to start digging. You could offer shovels or just do hands. Hands only would be messy, but it would probably lead to less severed worms in the wheelbarrow.
I kept going back and forth on whether or not I wanted to do party favors. At first I didn't because I think it's ridiculous to have to provide another treat for kids, but then I started seeing such cute bug and flower stuff from Oriental Trading and leaned towards doing them.
Such cute stuff here, here, and here. It's difficult to decided on an appropriate party favor also when you have such a wide range of age with the children attending. I ended up making these butterfly snack bags to mimic these filled with organic animal crackers from Costco and filled in with boxes of raisins. The kids had the option of taking from this basket as well as a butterfly net and a bubble stick. I also had tattoos inside of the turquoise watering can above for the kiddies to put on at the party. From working at a pediatric office for 6 1/2 years, I've learned that food, bubbles and tattoos are always good ideas for pleasing the littles.
The wheelbarrow was one of our gifts to Stella. I got it at Costco for $15. It came with a bucket/pail, watering can, rake and shovel. I picked up "Caterpillar to Butterfly" book from Goodwill (where most of her books came from). It's great because the caterpillar is on a string and "eats" through the colored pages and then makes his 3-D cocoon to become a butterfly on the last page. I also got her the cutest laminated "coloring" book. It has pages with bugs and flowers to color with washable markers. I got it one of my favorite stores in Smyrna-Love Street. It's not really for now since she's so small, but she can use it for years when she starts coloring.
Instead of gifts, we asked for friends and family to donate to No Kid Hungry. You can set up a donation page for anyone's birthday (www.nokidhungry.org/birthday) To be honest, this didn't work out well.....in the beginning. We still received gifts, just a few, nothing crazy. But no one really wanted to donate. I juggled around the idea of putting out a donation jar but then decided that would be tacky. So what I did was put a message out on both of our family Facebook pages thanking those who donated and included the link to her donation page. In all honesty, I knew only 1 or 2 people had donated, because I could see the dollar amount listed on the website, but because it was anonymous, I couldn't specifically thank those people. By doing this, it reminded people that they could still donate. It worked! The goal wasn't met, but a few hundred dollars was raised and I think that's great.
This girl's birthday and party turned out to be great. She was in a great mood the entire day. No meltdowns! The weather cooperated beautifully. After mostly everyone left and Doodlebug was napping, the grandparents and the remaining friends sat under the trees and talked about the day. Stella was one happy birthday girl. We are all so blessed!
Such cute stuff here, here, and here. It's difficult to decided on an appropriate party favor also when you have such a wide range of age with the children attending. I ended up making these butterfly snack bags to mimic these filled with organic animal crackers from Costco and filled in with boxes of raisins. The kids had the option of taking from this basket as well as a butterfly net and a bubble stick. I also had tattoos inside of the turquoise watering can above for the kiddies to put on at the party. From working at a pediatric office for 6 1/2 years, I've learned that food, bubbles and tattoos are always good ideas for pleasing the littles.
Never mind the 1 X 4 underneath the 2 front legs. Our yard isn't even here, but it was shaded for mostly everyone. Shade is important for an outdoor June birthday party in Georgia!
The wheelbarrow was one of our gifts to Stella. I got it at Costco for $15. It came with a bucket/pail, watering can, rake and shovel. I picked up "Caterpillar to Butterfly" book from Goodwill (where most of her books came from). It's great because the caterpillar is on a string and "eats" through the colored pages and then makes his 3-D cocoon to become a butterfly on the last page. I also got her the cutest laminated "coloring" book. It has pages with bugs and flowers to color with washable markers. I got it one of my favorite stores in Smyrna-Love Street. It's not really for now since she's so small, but she can use it for years when she starts coloring.
Family photo with the birthday girl.
Her first taste.
Oh, I can just hear her say, "Mommy, you did such a great job with my cake!"
"Here, try some Mommy. It's delicious!"
"And now some for you, Daddy."
"These sprinkles are amazing."
I love the looks she's giving me here. Something about it.
Sweet kisses from this 1 year old.
And now we've moved on the to torturing phase clean up part that accompanies a one year old's birthday party.
The horror!
If you have a summertime birthday, there's no better way to get clean than running through the sprinkler.
After getting "clean", Stella got her first haircut by Aunt Jessica. We decided to get rid of the double rat-tails and make it into a cute bob.
It looks precious on her, and so much thicker!
Cupcake butt.
Looking cool in my shades from UM & AJ.
She loves her chair from The Dobbin's family. Loves it even more now that she can sit down backwards in it by herself.
Chowing down on some leftover birthday cake.
She's finally starting to get a taste for watermelon.
And her Stelly belly is the perfect resting place!
The super cute height chart was a Baptism gift from UM & AJ. I wanted to wait until her first birthday to make the first mark. I'd like to try to remember to mark her growth every 3-6 months.
This girl's birthday and party turned out to be great. She was in a great mood the entire day. No meltdowns! The weather cooperated beautifully. After mostly everyone left and Doodlebug was napping, the grandparents and the remaining friends sat under the trees and talked about the day. Stella was one happy birthday girl. We are all so blessed!
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