I really like having unique parties. I don't like doing what everyone else is doing and even though florals and geometric shapes are super trendy right now, this color combination isn't which is how I feel it's different!

I was once told if you do something different, at least one thing needs to be familiar so people actually "get it." The example was if you're going to do a space movie and everything is all space-y with different planets and lots of new things, you need to keep the people human. Or the opposite route would be to have aliens on planet Earth - the aliens are different, but planet Earth is familiar. Makes sense, right?

Ok, off my teaching box.

So I love this color combination and how this baby girl birthday party isn't just PINK. Now without further ado, I bring you my baby's first birthday party.
I always need to have a date guests need to RSVP by. People seem to respond better when there's a deadline! ;) And it gives me the time I need to have a general idea of how much food to plan.
Time capsule. Read further for details.
This photo sums up my baby girl perfectly.
I made a time capsule and it was the best decision I have ever made. My husband saw that story, Letters from Heaven, which went viral about the girl who opened her time capsule when she turned 18 and she said it was the best birthday present ever, and he suggested we do it for our little girl too.

I wanted to create that same magical moment for my little one and asked the guests to bring a letter instead of gifts. Being the second girl, she already has everything she needs and the letters will be such a treasure when she's able to open them.
My floral letter "S" which turned out to look like the number "8" instead... (insert laughing/crying emoji here)

 Party favors!
I had an array of ages with the guests who came, so I decided to do different favors. I found some really fun ice cream lip glosses I got for the girls, toy rocket launchers for the boys, and just candy for the adults.
 Sweet baby. All professional photos were done by Xpressions Photography.

 Month by month photo banner, except with this one I decided to make a game out of it.
 I mixed the photos and the guests had to guess the correct order. Whoever got the most correct won!
I strung the pictures with twine and made the tissue paper flowers from a tutorial I found at Design Every Day.
For the flower banner I got my inspiration from A Practical Wedding, but instead of real flowers I used fake flowers and added knots of twine and crazy-fun pom-pom string.
It made for a great center piece and everyone seemed to enjoy the little game! It was a lot harder than they all thought it would be.
Guess Baby's Age free printable can be found here.

I also had her Baby Book and Baby Calendar (for milestones) laid out in case anyone wanted to look at them. If I was really on top of my game I would've made a little video of her with the videos of her first year. I'm going to try and make one for her time capsule.
I had the party at 3:00pm because that was after her nap so she'd be happy and rested. But because it wasn't at a meal time I just served snacks.

String cheese is her favorite food so I had to have that.
I made these little snack cups mostly for the kids, but everyone ended up enjoying them! They had Chex, peanuts, pretzel sticks and colored marshmallows.
 And then you can never go wrong with chips and guac.
 I made a cake for the guests to enjoy and...
 her own little smash cake because a one year old party isn't complete without a good cake smash!
Her time capsule box at the end of the party full of lots of lovely letters, party string, her hat and a dollar bill.

Here's the explanation for the dollar bill: another activity I love to do is this Korean tradition they do for their babies. I don't know what it's called, but you lay out 4 objects (paint brush = creativity, book = intelligence, string = long life, money = wealth) and whichever one the baby chooses will supposedly be what they become as an adult! And my baby chose the dollar bill. So it's just a fun little tradition and it will be fun to see if it comes true or not! (And it's also a great time filler because there's not a whole lot you can do for a one year old party!)

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If you're looking for a custom party package please email me and we can get started!
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My cute Mom has been a regular Christmas card client for the past few years and asked me to do theirs this year! My parents went to two nice vacations this year and since Christmas cards are the time where you are able to humbly brag about how great your life is (not my quote! Credit goes to The Daily Tay! I thought it was incredibly accurate for how Christmas cards go.), those two vacations were the highlight of the card.

They toured parts of Europe which was why we decided on "Happy Christmas" and then when you turn over the back they also went to Hawaii so we also put "Mele Kalikimaka!"

I'm still taking card designs if you are last minute and want me to take care of it for you! I can do 25 for $25. If you want more I can give you a price quote.

In honor of Rogue One coming out, here is a fun and free Star Wars party package to help celebrate!

I threw this party last year for my Star-Wars-fanatic husband's 30 year old birthday party! He's not into parties, but it was the big 3-0, so we had a party.
It was so much fun creating this and want to share it with you so you can have a fun party too! Check out the photo below for what I have included in this mega party package!

I don't know if I've mentioned this, but right now my family is living with my in-laws while my husband is attending helicopter piloting school. They just bought a new house and felt like they needed to turn their basement into an apartment. Well, low and behold, we (and maybe others) are the very reason they felt inclined to do so! Right now it's still under construction, but they're making every effort to make it a lovely space. The area under the stairs is getting turned into a little play area for kids. They put a little door in with a few windows cut out and right away, with just the framing done, my four year old started playing "ice cream shop" with the little "drive through window."

Every year I try to make a homemade Christmas gift. One year I made a fishing game, another year I made sock puppets. What I should make this year was pretty obvious after seeing how my daughter was playing pretend shop!

I made a bunch of felt food for her to play with and then it hit me how fun it would be to have signs, menus, and coupons to make the food shops seem even more real! She can't read yet, which was why I made most of the coupons "Buy 1 get 1 free,"  because that's pretty basic, but I know she'll end up playing with them however she wants anyways. More words makes it look more legit.
Here's a peek of the menus. Short and sweet 5"x7" menus that can be easily put up and taken down.
Here's a closer look at the felt food I made for her. I am not doing a tutorial on these because they're pretty self explanatory. (These donuts were my favorite! I couldn't stop myself from doing different combinations!)
Except for the cupcakes! These took forever, which is why there are only four. I found a pretty good tutorial here. I started making these at a cabin retreat with my aunts and cousins and after I had made them my cousin piped in, "You know, Ikea has cupcakes like that." Well, shoot! I should've just gone to Ikea! Haha!
These ice cream cones were fun too, but I didn't feel like getting too far out from the standard vanilla, chocolate, and strawberry. A tutorial can be found here.
And what's an ice cream summer shop without popsicles?? I had originally made the stick handles out of felt, but those were not sturdy enough. I decided to trade them in for the real thing, popsicle sticks, and those did the trick.


Get all of the free printables here! (Donut Shop/Cone Castle/Cupcake Cafe sign, menu and coupon) I'm going to laminate them so they last longer and don't get ripped or smudged and I suggest you do as well!

I hope your kids have just as much pretend fun as I know mine will! So excited for her!! (And all of that time she'll be playing by herself!! Score! ;)
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Do you feel like you have some rad babysitting skills, but not any money for a real Christmas present??

OR are the people you're giving to have everything, but what they really want money can't buy??

Then I have the solution for you! Christmas coupons! Just like those love/Valentine's coupons, only it's for Christmas. And the person who you're giving to is more likely to cash-in and use said coupon you are presenting to.

In my family there are four siblings. We rotate who we're going to give to each year to simplify the giving process. Instead of buying four gifts, we do one big gift because four is on the verge of being a lot to take on financially and thoughtfully.

This year my brother and his wife both wanted the same thing - alone time together! (What was funny was I asked them separately, so they didn't know that the other had said the exact same thing!) So how do you "buy" alone time?? It's not really something you can wrap up and give. Which was how I came up with the coupon idea. I am offering to watch their kids so they can get out and have a home-away-from-home date.

It's free. It's what they want. It's a win-win.

I added a "suggestion weekend" because my brother already has an idea of when he wants to do it, so I was making it a planned suggestion for his wife. OR if you have a weekend that works best for your schedule you can write it in. I hate getting plans dumped on me last minute which was why I added the 2 week notification. Let's keep some class, people! -->Side note, I read this article about how some people aren't really RSVPing to parties any more and how rude is that?? I know we're all busy, but please, for the sake of the planner's sanity reply back!

Anyways, enjoy your free coupon/Christmas gift idea!

I actually wasn't going to post anything about this event because it was pretty uneventful!

Except for the time during set up when I forgot my pegs for my shelves to put into my bookshelf for my display...
That was stressful.

My heart literally fell into my stomach.
 Luckily, my husband was there helping me so he was able to find them at a store nearby!
But other than that, I came, I went. I actually didn't do as well as I thought I would, so that was disappointing. And I can't nail down a reason either. At each event I feel there's always something different, so it's hard for me to pick out what's my top seller and what's not.
 But this ol' Clementine print is my top seller online!
And look! It's in a customer's hand!
The girls who put this event on had a photographer come to take pictures of the place and how could I not share these! I love them!

They capture all the feels for how a craft show goes. I mean, check out those twinkle lights. They always make events so magical.
 It was a beautiful venue with tons of killer vendors. They sure hit the mark and did a great job.