Happy Birthday To You

 We are all still recovering from the big day because we all had too much fun. I feel like the vision that I had in my mind for months now truly came to life. Nothing would have been possible that day without my family who helped me get everything set up the night before and put in place the day of.  I feel like I have been planning this party for months now and it was over so quickly that I feel like I didn't get to really sit back and enjoy it. Next year we plan on throwing a more layed back affair with a pool and a grill and a few decorations. If you know me or my family you know we don't do anything small so I say it will be low key, but only time will tell.

I do want to say thank you again to everyone who came out to celebrate our precious girl. We had a full house and it was quite chaotic and loud, but I wouldn't have it any other way.

Like I said I feel like I started planning this party months ago and it all started with a dress and snowballed from there. I found most of my inspirations from Pinterest and online resources, but mostly Pinterest. I knew I wanted everything to be shabby chic and girly which is my go to decor. Not sure when I got to be all girly, but I guess that is my style now.

I might have written a few posts about my party planning endeavors

1,  2,  3,  4,  5,  and The 1 Year Post. Like a said just a few.

Thank goodness for blogging because it helps hold me accountable for things I say I am going to do. I feel like if I write it on here then I have to do it. Maybe I should write a post about losing 5 pounds. I swear I am more motivated and have a better schedule when school is in. I though I would have all the time in the world this summer to relax and workout, but being home all day with a 1 year old and keeping her happy, fed, dry, entertained, safe, takes up most of my days and when she isn't awake I am cleaning or cooking or playing on Facebook or Pinterest working on lesson plans.

Now on to the party. I only wish I had a better camera to take my pictures with because even ones that looked great on my viewer cam out a but blurry, but when can you do.

We started setting up everything the Friday night before the party and I thought it would only take about an hour. Skip to 3 hours later, some pizza, and a fussy little lady and we were pretty much done except for putting out the food and hanging her month picture banner which I sadly did not get a great picture of and I may hang back up in our house so I can get one.

Sweets table

Lanterns

Food Table

 

Cake smashing and present opening location

Birthday wardrobe

I have to show off all of the hard work poor Car Car did for us outside. We planned on setting up Mckinley's new water table and some baby pools and letting the babies play, but it was just too darn hot

We woke up early Saturday because we wanted to make sure the Little Lady took a nap before her party and I did some last minute party prep and thought we were good to go. Bless my poor sweet husband because he has to put up with me for the rest of his life and he should have known I would forget something and forget something I did. You see I had grand visions of a banner with all of the stickers I used on her monthly pictures and my favorite picture from that month. In true Roxanne fashion I forgot to take her 12 month picture the night before and order it to be ready for the next day and somehow I was missing a few of the pictures I wanted to use. This meant I had to wake the birthday girl up early to get it and I wanted her to sleep as long as possible.

Good news. I got the shot.maybe because I planted my happy bottom on the kiosk chair and chewed my fingernails off and I think he skipped a few people to get me my pictures because it only took about 20 minutes and I was off.

I was so thankful to my family because when I arrived almost everything was set up, but I still felt like a chicken with its head cut off. I immediately started working on hanging the month banner and quickly realized I was missing some pictures and started panicking, but thankfully my MIL who always knows how to handle my particular brand of crazy suggested I may have left them in this particular box I brought a few important things in and sure enough they were there. Sadly I some how misplaced a few month pictures, but no one knew by me so no big deal. Of course a few people (my family) showed up early, but it was nice to get to see them before the madness began. After that everyone started rolling in and the party got underway.

I wanted to get 1 picture before everyone arrived and we all got overwhelmed

The spread

 Month banner. Thankfully I thought to save the month stickers I used on Mckinley's onesies because I didn't think of this until a few weeks before her birthday I picked my favorite picture from that month and my favorite monthly picture. I place the month sticker on a white paper doily, hung 3 lines of rope and attached everything with clothes pins. Mckinley's name at the very bottom was made from letter my MIL had used at her baby shower. I just updated them with new colors to match our color scheme

I wanted to create a time capsule for Mckinley to open when she is 18 so I had everyone fill out a few different sheets saying where she would attend college, what she would be like in high school, what she will be when she grew up and then they could write her a little note. I also had everyone sign a special copy of a collection of Winnie The Pooh poems I have been keeping for years (I thankfully have 2 copies of this book so prepare to sign one for the next little). This was also where we set yo the plates and silverware.

A copy of Mckinley's birthday invitation and a note asking everyone to fill her time capsule.

The sweets table Candy, candy, and more candy!, Homemade butter mints made by my awesome sister, Homemade cream puffs made by my sister and Homemade rainbow whoopie pies made by yours truly, and the cake. I love how this all came together.

Team D

Family and Friends

Presents!
Mckinley initially seemed to be interested in opening presents, but after 1 toy was opened she was over it and just wanted to play with that so I got to open everything which was quite fun.

Cake Smash Time! Sadly she didn't care for the icing on her hands so sadly no cake smashing actually happened.

After everything was winding down I wanted 1 "After" picture, but Mckinley was SO over having her picture  which led to these oh so happy memories

I just want to say THANK YOU again to everyone who came out to help celebrate our little lady. It really meant so much to us that you were all there.