the party details

warm. romantic. innocent. whimsical. carefree. soft. nostalgic. 

 

 

When I plan one of the girls’ birthday parties, I have to start with a theme, either an object or a color scheme or a feeling. When they are too young to dictate these things,  I get to choose and I typically choose the birthday girl’s favorite animal, toy, or activity as the springboard for my creative process. I knew this would be the last year I’d have free reign on a birthday party theme, so I could. not. resist. the tea party theme.

Once I have a theme, I start looking for fabric or paper that coordinates and the details develop from there. In this case, I was already working with a particular line of fabric for Addie’s bedroom and I was excited to work it into the decor. I knew that bringing some fabric outside would soften the environment. Plus I love dual function. Bedroom decor that doubles as party decor. perfect. Finished pieces included several throw pillows and a quilt. Fabric line is Penelope by Holly Holderman for Lakehouse Dry Goods.

With the leftover material, I made a very scrappy streamer thingy. Tissue paper puffs, knotted fabric strips, fabric pennants, coffee filter balls…I draped the streamer from the outer tree branches to the chandelier in the middle and it totally dressed up the whole area.

For extra whimsy, I tied a few huge balloons on really long ribbons to float around the perimeter of the party. This balloon was tied to a little chalkboard arrow sign that read “Tea Party”. (Sometimes I like to balance my dual-purpose items with totally purposeless items….)

HAD to have hats for the party. After the royal wedding, can anyone honestly say they don’t want an excuse to put something big and extravagant on their head? I got so giddy making hats for the girls and myself, I called my mom and sister to make sure they wanted one, too. “Oh, no, I just can’t stand wearing something on my head,” they both said. Suit yourself. Then mom came over to play tea party treat making with me. You should have seen her face when I showed her my hat. She spent a good part of the rest of the night making hats for herself, my sister, and my sis-in-law. You can find more details on how to make fascinators here.

After coming across this blog, I was smitten with the idea of including little food labels on the treat table. I had purchased some digital brushes from House of 3 before they closed up shop and this was the perfect little project to play around in Photoshop. I don’t know a drop of French, but it was great entertainment typing the names of my desserts into an online translator. Whether they translated correctly or not is a mute point as none of us read or speak French. (another purposeless detail…)  The “eat Cake” accent was also a House of 3 printable. I just recently saw some of these designs at a scrapbook store, so you may be able to get stamps or printouts that way. They are part of the Parisian Anthology line. Olivia and I just doctored everything up with a little glitter.

And finally, the tea itself. You remember the china and the cups and saucers and linens that we thrifted? Well, they all came together beautifully, don’t you think?

Water was the preferred base for the girls’ beverage concoctions. Want to make some adorable little sugar “cubes?” just mix some granulated sugar with a few drops of water and a little food coloring and stir into a paste. Pack into a candy or butter mold and immediately dump out onto wax paper; allow to dry. I need to do a little more research on the coloring part of this because my sugar cubes faded after a couple days – thoughts on that? Also, how much fun would it be to serve pink “tea?” I didn’t remember that trick until the day after the party when I was taking these sugar cube closeups. aw, well, I can do the pink tea for Olivia’s birthday in September. Her party theme choice has evolved from “butterfly” to “butterfly tea party.” 

What do you think? Does it look like this two year old is having fun? 

 

Details of the Secret Garden Cake can be found here.