Kennedy's Vintage Circus 1st Birthday Party
I can't even believe that our little Kennie is 1 year old. I wish I could hit some pause button so I could soak up just a little more time of this baby stage. She has been such a joy to our family, the happiest baby all the time! As sad as I was that this year has passed so quickly, I was beyond excited to throw her a beautiful party surrounded by all those who love and cherish her as much as Lennie and I do.
Leotard: Amazon / Tutu & Headband: Homemade
Trying to decide on a theme was actually a little difficult for me. There are so many great ideas and inspiration floating around on Pinterest, how was I to decide. I was talking to Mom one day about the ideas I had and she told me about a carousel cake my Grandmother had made her for a birthday when she was little. She remembered every detail and how special it made her feel that her mother, not being very crafty, had pulled together such a beautiful cake. I knew after that conversation that I wanted to create a party around recreating that carousel cake.
I made these gold marque letters using cardboard letters from hobby lobby and white Chirstmas tree lights. I just cut the front of the letter off, sprayed them gold and poked holes to push the lights through. The light pink crepe paper streamers are from Carte Fini. They have THE best crepe paper. It's so thick and sturdy, totally stood up to the good breeze we had that day without a single tear.
I have to brag for like a second...you guys I decorated that cake! My super awesome friend stacked and crumb coated the cake layers for me and gave me a quick lesson on using fondant, but I did the rest. It's far from perfect, but I was really proud to have been able to make my baby girls birthday cake. How cute is the felt circle garland hanging in the tissue pop and paper lantern arrangement?! It was probably the easiest thing I made for the party. I use the 1 inch Circle die and Sizzix Big Shot to cut out black, white, pink and glitter gold felt then just zipped them through the sewing machine on a straight stitch. Check out what else I made with my Sizzix big shot right HERE.
Lollipics created these awesome personalized suckers specially for Kennie's party. I just sent them the image I wanted and they did the rest! I wanted to use them as an activity at the party as well so I created an image of a monkey and flower in black and white. We used food coloring markers to color them in so the kids could take home their own edible work of art. Although, the suckers are so yummy that most of them were consumed at the party. The white ones are toasted marshmallow...YUM! Check out all of Lollipics flavors HERE.
We had a simple little buffet. The party was at 2:00 pm so I didn't feel the pressure to put on a whole luncheon. Just a few snacks to balance out all the sweets. Buttered popcorn, soft pretzels with mustard, and mini corn dogs on washi tape covered sticks. I couldn't have a circus party without cotton candy in adorable stripe bags and donut holes because they are the boys favorite. I found mint carnival tickets at a party supply store and used them around some of the containers and pinned them to the cotton candy with mini clothes pins.
I had this vintage milk bottle from our weekly dairy delivery company and filled it with Gumballs and Chocolate candies. We obviously had to have circus peanuts and animal crackers. We had a basic drink station with Kool Aid pouches on ice, mini water bottles and lemonade.
I created these cute little party favors using clear candy tubes topped with adorable gold animals. I made a circle image just like the lollipics and added a "Thank You" banner. I also created these circus water bottle wrappers to make them extra special. A painted mason jar held matching paper straws and these solo cups add a clean pop of black.
It was pretty much a miracle that we got a family photo with everyone smiling! Getting everyone to actually look at the camera would have been asking too much though.
Kennie did work on her smash cake! Her faces crack me up every time I look at these pictures. I kind of waited till the last minute to order invites and a printable party package so I ended up creating them all myself. The great thing about that is that I saved a blank version so that you could download them for your own personal use. Here are the examples as I used them and I'll share the link to download them at the bottom of the post.
If I hadn't have been so late sending these out I would have mailed them with gold glitter and a pink balloon inside with the invite.
Here is what the printable package looks like all finished. You can click HERE to download the entire party package as a PDF or JPG. They are all formatted to print on 8.5 x 11 white cardstock paper. They are all blank so you can customize the documents to fit your party.