Party Planning | Cup of Tea

Mercy. I have a One year old.

You have been hearing all about the party planning and prep for several weeks now! So I thought I would share some pictures of the day itself, and some of the decorating touches.

One of the tricky parts of being in serious party planning mode is that you may forget to take pictures yourself. So I had to rely on a few Grandpa “shaky hand” pictures 🙂

But you’ll get the idea!!

Since we had all the family in town for Elizabeth’s birthday, we decided we would also have Elizabeth’s dedication at our church that same day. It was such a beautiful time, celebrating Elizabeth and dedicating her to God, as well as my husband and I, as her parents, who are charged with guiding her. So sweet.

Elizabeth did enjoy the Children’s Story, and peeking over at Grandpa!

On to the party that afternoon! The birthday girl actually slept through 1 whole hour of her party! I had to wake her up to do the cake 🙂

But once she was up and about, she loved cruising from room to room in our house, chatting with the guests.

We had quite the housefull!! We had over 40 people there, with 15 kids under 3! Crazy! But we all had such a blast!!

Thank goodness for our finished playroom in the front of the house. It was constantly full of kids AND adults.

Elizabeth’s face when everyone started singing Happy Birthday was priceless! She looked so pleased! She started clapping, too. But she was a dainty cake eater (thank goodness!). She took little bites, and only managed to eat a quarter of cake.

On Sunday morning, we went back to the playroom to open gifts!!

It was such a fun time with family and friends! Elizabeth is so loved, and it was such a blast having everyone together to shower her with love!

Since our theme was basically “Autumn”, I got to take advantage of my typical Fall decorations, and then kick it up a tiny notch. Here’s what I did!

For the front porch, I bought tons of mums! I thought one bright yellow mum at the corner, by the driveway, would be cheerful and a nice greeting. I tucked some raffia inside the pot to dress it up a little.

I loved the way the front porch came together!

On the front porch steps, I stacked various sizes of pumpkins and mums on the stairs. I decided again to tuck in raffia to tie it all together.

My urn planter still has some summer flowers in it. I didn’t want to replant it, so I decided that mini pumpkins and raffia would make it look on theme.

I jazzed up my usual raffia wreath with a simple chalkboard hung from it. I picked up the chalk board in the dollar section at Target.

Moving inside, besides the typical decorations of faux pumpkins in cabinets and wreaths on doors, I did a few other touches.

In the playroom, we hung up some burlap twine and hung some pictures from Elizabeth’s first year.

We also did something similar near the food table. I printed off Elizabeth’s monthly pictures and just simply taped them up on the wall with some glittery gold washi tape.

The color is poor, BUT my mom borrowed a felt flower garland from a friend of hers. In fact, the garland got used at my sister’s wedding as well. It’s made the rounds at our family events 🙂 This bay window is our eat in kitchen area, behind our kitchen table, where we had all the food staged. It helped dress up the area.

I forgot to snap a picture of the table fully set, but you get an idea of what we did! I found a brown plaid blanket at Ikea on my August trip. We casually placed it on the table, and used some boxes underneath to raise up a few platters.

On the mantle, I added in a faux door swag inside my large lantern. For height (it’s a HUGE built in TV nook over our fireplace, but we don’t have a TV!) I wanted an arrangement in my hurricane urn. My mom literally just walked out to my front yard, snipped some branches, and came in and arranged it. I think it looks amazing!

I wish I had some more pictures to share! I kicked myself after it was all said and done that I didn’t take pictures myself.

There may be better pictures floating out there that family and friends took, but I hated to wait!! If there are real gems, I’ll keep you posted 🙂

TGIF! I’m currently working my TAIL off, as a personal slave to my mother, as we prep for a Bridal Shower for my sister on Sunday. But you know what?? I’m having a blast 🙂

Here’s what I was up to this week:

1. We spent the weekend up in Virginia Beach with my in-laws. We had a fabulous time!! We went to the Aquarium, hung out with family, had a date night (sans babies) with my sister-in-law and her husband, and took Elizabeth to the beach for her first toe dip in the ocean. She cried…. this was expected. After we dined al fresco, and she recovered.

2. I’m not sure if going out of town JUST prior to me leaving for two weeks was a blessing or a curse. On the one hand, I basically did laundry, then repacked my suitcase. That was handy! But I felt like I lost a few days of work to prep being gone for 2 weeks. Oh well!

3. My husband and I celebrated our 7 year anniversary on Tuesday! We had planned to eat out that evening to celebrate, but that morning I wanted to go out for breakfast. My husband looked a little disappointed and asked “But I thought we were going to dinner tonight?”, to which I replied “I want to do both!”. Milk the out to eats while I can 🙂

4. Elizabeth and I had a pretty easy flight up to Michigan! It went very smooth. Fingers crossed its that simple on the way back home.

5. On a blog related note, I’ve written many blog posts that will go out over the next few weeks. So don’t worry!! I’m not 100% disappearing 🙂 Did you see this week’s birthday wishlist or outfits I packed posts? I also finished the last 6 days of the 30 Outfits in 30 Days Challenge!!! Woohoo! Stay tuned Tuesday for a recap of all 30 outfits. I was pretty chuffed when I saw them all together.

Let me know what you’ve been up to in the comments below! Have a great weekend!

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