We are finally back to making progress in the kitchen but not enough for a full blog post so I thought it might be fun to post pictures from the birthday party we threw for our TWO (how??) year old.
My original career plan after college was to be an event planner. I pretty quickly realized I like having my nights and weekends to myself though so I’ve settled for throwing themed parties instead. Last year, we hosted a Winter ONEderland party and this year I decided on a tropical TWO-tti Frutti theme. In case you’re wondering, the plan for next year is “Odessa’s 3 Ring Circus” unless she decides she’s done with my ideas and wants to choose her own theme.
Here’s a glimpse of last year’s party. I bought out the silver and rose gold bottle brush trees from the Target Dollar Spot every time they restocked for months and used them all over the party.
We knew a large chunk of our family wouldn’t be able to make it this year so we decided to send out invitations to OG’s classmates. Kyle found a template in Canva and then tweaked it to fit the theme.
I spent the week leading up to the party blowing up balloons and putting together balloon garlands and other decorations throughout the house. I had planned on putting one above our front porch but since it was supposed to be rainy the day of the party, I decided to nix that one and just go with the three I had planned for inside the house. Outside, we blew up flamingo and pineapple floats that we already owned, hung a garland I ordered from this Etsy shop, and put up a “Welcome” poster mounted to foam board. We had the poster printed at Staples and grabbed the foam board at a craft store.
Inside, we set up the goody bags and a “Thank You” sign on the entry table along with another one of those flamingo and pineapple garlands, one of OG’s stuffed flamingos, and a little wooden pineapple we bought in Haiti a few years ago.
We cleared probably about 80% of her toys out of the playroom and left out a few toys, puzzles, and blocks and set out coloring pages and crayons. I set up the gift table in here with a “Happy Birthday” sign I ordered from amazon and I had a few photos printed to go over her toy shelf with the balloon arch. I also pulled out some tassel garlands I made for my friend’s baby shower a few years ago and we strung them up using command strips.
We threw some table cloths over shelves and furniture we didn’t want the kids to mess with (our shelf full of vinyls between the playroom and family room, the gift table that had my computer equipment under it, and a dresser in the family room hallway) which worked pretty well. I think we ended up with 8 kids ranging from a year old to 4 years old so we tried to keep things we didn’t want touched pretty well hidden and tried to keep the toys and crayons easily accessible.
Of course, I also had to decorate the pictures of our pups who were at camp during the party; those are pineapple glasses on Barley, if you can’t tell.
Balloon arch #2 helped to hide the yet-to-be-finished opening between the family room and kitchen.
I didn’t take a picture of the food set up or the few decorations on the kitchen shelves. The party was at 1 so we provided a lunch spread plus beer, wine, water, juice, and soda. I ordered 2 sandwich rings (turkey and ham) and a platter of chicken tenders from Publix plus chips and dip, goldfish, cheese puffs, and two large fruit salads. We also served falafel and hummus as well as spanakopita as vegetarian options which were a big hit. And then of course cake (and cupcakes both from Publix)!
I used a tropical table cover from Target to cover the back doors and hung balloon arch #3. I ordered a flamingo and “Happy Birthday” cake topper from amazon for the cake and fruit themed toppers (amazon) for the cupcakes. I also purchased balloons and a template from The Creative Heart Studio to make a flamingo balloon mosaic. I was going to make a watermelon slice too but I ran out of time. The flamingo actually wasn’t even finished the way it was supposed to be but I deemed it “good enough” and rolled with it.
I always like to make sure we have plenty of options for seating so in addition to the lounge furniture in the family room, we also pushed our dining table to the window and set up an extra table and chairs. I went to Lidl the week before the party and bought a butt load of fruit to decorate with. The table cloths I bought at Lidl a few years ago when I hosted my friend’s baby shower and they worked perfectly for the party. Those pineapples were $0.99/each and we sent them home with a few of our friends after the party!
Overall it was such a fun day! I was a little anxious leading up to it because OG’s first birthday party was the last time I saw my dad completely coherent before his passing and it was hard knowing he wouldn’t be there this year. That’s honestly probably one reason I threw myself so deep into the planning and decorating leading up to it and thankfully I was so busy the day of I didn’t have much time to dwell on it. I’m extremely thankful for the family, friends, and classmates of OG’s that showed up to celebrate with us. I wasn’t social most of last year and it was nice to see everyone and feel like a real person again.
Anyway. It’s hard to believe we have a two year old! It feels almost impossible that it has already been two years and at the same time that it’s only been two years. Time is a weird thing.
This weekend we’re hoping to knock off a few things from our kitchen list! I stained the last two floating shelves yesterday so Kyle just needs to hammer the top one into place and those will officially be done. You can’t really tell but I didn’t tape off the bottom shelf and ended up staining some of the grout so I’ll have to touch that up at some point,
I’m also hoping Kyle can get the ceiling primed and that we can do a lot of work on the trim that we’ve already installed (crown, window, hood). I also need to finish up a tiny bit of grout but that should only take a few minutes. If we can get a lot of time to work (which just depends on the toddler’s mood), I think we can have the already installed trim all patched and painted or at least prepped for painting this weekend! In case you don’t follow me on instagram, here is a look at the two floating shelves I stained yesterday. Don’t ask me why we haven’t put outlet covers back on. It takes two seconds but we just haven’t done it yet. One of those silly little things that’s easy to do but takes you years to actually get done I guess!
Have a great weekend!
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