Owen's First Birthday: The Party!

Thank goodness for my family and friends (mainly Scot) who arrived early enough for me to actually put my party planning vision to life!

The party was a huuuge success (at least in my book). Granted, the last kid's party that I went to I was a guest at, but it seemed like everyone had a great time.

After everyone started to trickle in (of course there was bad traffic that day), we got started on the dogs! Grampa made sure the hot dogs were cooked thoroughly and we used our little hot dog spinny thing (real technical here) to keep them nice and warm. Plus the canopy doubled to warm up the buns!

(Again, the photos are correct on my computer, but upload crooked! :( )

My parents got a swing for Owen, so my dad hung that up while he was hanging up the paper lanterns. We gave it a test ride while everyone was mixing and mingling and then let our friend Carter take a turn as well! I'm so happy we have the swing! Now Owen has a place to sit and watch the wind blow through the trees (one of his favorite things to do outside)

And since we only had one "older" kid in attendance, I set up a Mickey Mouse bowling game for her. Super simple thing that took me about 10 minutes to make. I put some sand at the bottom of it because I thought that they'd blow over, but that made them impossible to knock down! Anyways, Alli enjoyed her game and made new friends with my brother and his girlfriend. :)

After some hanging out time, we moved to the cake! During "Happy Birthday" Owen decided to help us out with the "singing". Although the pictures may depict him as being afraid of all of us singing at him, he was actually yelling back at us!

Side-eyeing us blowing out his candle!

I made cupcakes and Owen's cake from scratch. Owen's was a layered vanilla and chocolate cake. Once the initial tests showed that it was indeed edible, that hand did. not. stop. shovelling cake into his mouth! Andrew and I took pictures with him and he just ate the whole time!

Needless to say, he was a mess after eating almost half the cake. (Nope, he didn't stop, we had to make him!) Gramsie cleaned him up, Granddaddy assisted with a wardrobe change, and he was good to go again!

Presents were had and enjoyed. I think his favorite at the time was the box that his Little People zoo came in. Once that present was open, he was all about looking at the box!

And then he clapped his appreciation! Such a spoiled boy :)

After presents, everyone mixed and mingled some more... Owen's bestfriend finnnally woke up (the kid slept through everything!), so the boys got to hang out and discover the wonderfulness of balloons together. And we got to play in the photobooth :)

Owen was running on empty near the end there, even with all of that cake, so we put him down for his first(!) "nap" of the day after some play time with bestfriend James. Some of our friends stuck around later, so we ordered Chinese food and cleaned up the kitchen (a big thank you to Michelle!) and then got ready for our big Disneyland day!

Owen's First Birthday: The Crafts!

Alright, might as well get this blog officially started, right??
(And if anyone knows how to flip pictures around so they're right side up... Let me know!!!!!)

And what's better than kicking it off with my son's first birthday Disney extravaganza!

This past Saturday we hosted a Mickey Mouse themed party at our house. I made most of the decorations: simple felt table runners, signage, pennant banners for the various tables, and cupcakes! Of course I didn't get everything I wanted to done, but I'm (slowly) learning that if it's not there people won't notice!

My mom was awesome enough to make this awesome Birthday Balloon Wreath to greet guests at the front door! We bought a Mickey Mouse from Walmart and since the wreathe was big enough, we just popped him in the center! And now we can switch it out for all birthday themes and even hang it for Mom and Dad's birthdays too!

 We had some signs along our walkway with some typical Mickey phrases.

Once inside, we had our little entryway table cleared off and filled with the Mickey Thank You goodies! We only had 4 little ones at the party, so their goody bags were a bit fuller than the typical ;) For the adults, I made some of my infamous cookies, packaged them, and sealed them with a Thank You sticker! (They read: "Thank you for making my day mouse-ka-tastic! Love, Owen")

Our huge formal living room is still acting as the play area, so we kept the play mat and toys in there for the little ones to play with and then set up the photo booth in the second half of the room! (It's a big, long room!) Presents were piled on our dresser-turned-buffet table and since I'm lame and I love guest books of any kind, I bought "Happy Birthday to You" by Dr. Seuss and had everyone sign it! And of course, Mickey ear party hats and a Happy Birthday Owen banner hung above!

I also made a chicken wire frame and filled it with pictures of Owen and his firsts and some favorites. That thing filled up quickly! I was going to tie strips of paper/ribbon and write to explain the pictures, but not enough room/time for that!

In the living room, all the mantel decorations were taken down and replaced with sunflowers and a Mickey balloon centerpiece! This is the only place in the whole house that I can keep flowers since the cats love to get into them! I spray painted old timey Barq's root beer bottles that my grandma found at her Sam's Club. I love love love how they turned out! My mom made the Mickey head and the red and yellow balloon ball in the same way she did the wreathe.

I made the banner that hung on the fireplace. Each Mickey head has a picture of Owen on his month birthdays! The black Mickey heads are the 3-D folded paper pinwheel things and everything else I used my handy dandy Cricut for!

We moved our kitchen table and put our desserts on it. The rest of the food was outside, but we didn't want the frosting to melt on the cupcakes or bugs to get into them! Cupcakes were homemade and nothing fancy with decoration. The hubs made the Mickey oreos!

Outside was where we had our Hot Diggity Dog bar! I moved the dresser from our guest bedroom outside, added a felt runner and some Mickey art and voila! The art is actually a huge bag from the Disney store that I taped around some canvas! Seriously, easiest decoration ever. The runner was simply felt sheets sewn together, another easy 10-minute project for the win!

We had the usual condiments, cheese, onions, and chili for people to top their hot dogs with! I even splurged a little and purchased a vintage hot dog roller for $30. I figure we have a lot of parties and hot dog eating in our future and we might as well make it fun!

For the outside decorations, my mom and I made a long paper chain to hang on our fence. I ordered various paper lanterns from Luna Bazaar and I am definitely keeping them out there until the end of summer!

Yep, we even tied bows to the plastic tablecloths!

Well, I think that's it for now! I'll post on the actual party itself and our awesome Disneyland trip later!