A Princess Tea Party!

Every time I look at my blog I cant believe how long it has been since I last wrote a post! You would probably be silly if you believed me this time when I say I am going to be blogging more often. :) I so wish I had the time to do more regular posts.  I have about ten blog posts in the works that I need to catch up on. So many fun ones! They are coming, (someday) please bare with me!
In November my little girl turned four. FOUR. That just simply sounds old.  This year for her birthday I was 6 months pregnant and sick.  I kept saying it would be a more low key party because I was quite sick and we had just taken on a huge redesign project at church. (fun future post!) However my smart little cookie had a different idea.  Lola can tell you about each and every one of her birthday parties, we usually go all out and I have so much fun planning them for her.  This year was a little different, she knew exactly what she wanted: A Princess Party. Ugh. I think I asked her if she was sure 100 times, and suggested 100 different theme ideas. ;) I do not love the tradition birthday party themes, I enjoy coming up with something a little more original, and special.  So we decided to combine two of her favorite things so it could be a little more unique, princesses & tea parties! (she gets her love of tea from her Mimi!)  Lola loved the idea and we went to town on the invitations. Here's how they turned out!

Front:

Back:

 After the invitations were ordered, Lola & I headed to Hobby Lobby to find our party inspiration.  We were looking for the perfect tea party fabric to cover the table.  Lola picked pink, she will always pick pink!  Here is the fabric we chose together, as well as 20 yards of pink tulle to create a fun table skirt. I simply pleated the tulle as I sewed it to the fabric.  It was super easy, and I think it had a big impact! 

I knew a main part of the tea party would be finding all the cute food holders. I started looking around but got a little discouraged when I realized how much they cost and how many I would need to buy in order to create the look I had come up with.  I spent a little time on Pinterest and my problem was solved! I would make them! My husband would make them! I am so blessed to have married someone who entertains all my crazy ideas and helps me figure out how we can make them all happen! 

After a quick visit to St. Vincent de Paul and Goodwill, I had all the candle stick holders we needed.  William cut plywood for the tops into the shapes and sizes I desired and routered the edges to make them look finished.  He glued the plywood tops to the candlestick holders and then spray painted them for me.  (Usually I am the spray painter, but I was 6+ months pregnant and it was November so it had to be done in the garage.) :/  

I absolutely love how they turned out!  I couldn't have found ones I liked better if I had bought them in a store. Total cost for 9 food holders was right around $40.

I bought some fun supplies for our party online!  I wanted the girls to drink out of real teacups to make it more tea-party-y (is that a word? Ha!) however, in the interest of my carpet I looked for an alternative that is more 2-4 year old and carpet friendly. :) I found these square bottles and thought they were so cute.  Bonus was that they came with lids.  I had my handy husband drill holes in the lids so we could use some adorable stripped paper straws. We wrapped them with a little ribbon and they were all set! Lola helped with so much of her party this year!  Usually I am doing all these projects alone, but this year she wanted to be apart of it all which was so fun!  I ordered most of my fun party supplies online from Shop Sweet Lulu. I was so impressed with their quick delivery, reasonable prices and adorable shipping material.  I will use them again for all my future parties!

Lola really wanted to serve pink tea.  I am not a tea drinker, so I am not sure if there even is pink tea?  We instead went with pink lemonade.  It was a hit, who doesn't want to drink straight (pink!) sugar? :)

Since we were unable to use teacups for the kids' drinks, I wanted to find another way to have teacups displayed on the table.  I decided they would be perfect for holding the cupcakes at each place setting.  Another trip to Goodwill and I found some little teacups that worked perfect! I paid only .50 each. Bought some cute cupcake liners and we were all set! 

I always purchase my cupcakes from Safeway, not very glamorous I know! But they are surprisingly tasty, reasonably priced and they always allow me to bring in my own sprinkles that they will use on the cupcakes for me so they match our party. 

It was a lot of fun to pick out the food for the party.  I wanted to have an adult display of party food, as well as separate food for the kiddos that would be displayed on their par-tea table.  Lola helped picked out the food and chose some of her favorite snacks!

Here is the spread:

Cupcakes

Animal Cookies

Rice Krispies Treats

Mini Pot Pies

Caramel Apple Pops

                                                    Little Smokies

Here is my little helper making the Rice Krispies Treats! :)

I made some tulle pom poms to hang from the ceiling to add some more color & fun!

This is the adult buffet:

The Tea Party Table:

For favors we gave each girl a princess crown & wand, and each boy got a prince crown & a sword. 

We also made bags of Pink Princess Popcorn for all of our guests to take home.  It was pink tinted chocolate drizzled over popcorn, and boy was it tasty!

The birthday girl:

The party planners :)

This was my favorite party yet! Each year is more & more fun as Lola is getting older and wants to help me plan, shop, and decorate everything for her party. Cant wait to hear her ideas for next year! : )

A Big Sister & Brother to Be...

We are very excited to announce that we are having another baby! Little baby "L" is due in early February 2013! Lola is SO excited to have another baby brother, or a sister! (She is really hoping for a sister though!)  She has asked on a regular basis when we can have another baby since the day Logan came home from the hospital. :) To say she loves her brother would be the understatement of the year, and she is most definitely his favorite person as well.  Lola is 3 1/2 and Logan just turned 1 this month.  The age gap this time around will be about half of what Lola and Logan's is, I am looking forward to experiencing something new! 

I really wanted to do something fun with these two cuties as a way to reveal it to the "world" aka Facebook! :) I have seen these chalkboard signs used for a lot of things these days and think it is so cute! Knowing I would never find what I had dreamed up, I decided to just look for a unique and fun frame that I could turn into what I wanted! Ten stores later, I found it! (Thank you Target!) I found this mirror and instantly loved the shape! It was perfect! A little dis-assembly and spray paint and we were in business.  I sprayed the frame white, and the mirror portion with the chalkboard paint.  It was such a quick and easy process.  

Here is the original mirror before its makeover:

In hindsight, it may have been significantly easier to use a different product besides chalk, as I forgot to take into consideration the tiny hands that would be holding this sign and how easily it smudges into a complete disaster. :/ Thankfully it still worked out!

Who wants to be a big brother? This guy! :)

 Logan, how do you feel about not being the baby anymore?

We sure love these two, and are looking so forward to meeting baby L # 3! :) 

 

Logan's Monster Nursery!

Long before I knew my sweet baby was a boy, I started dreaming up how I would decorate a little boy's nursery. I knew I didn't want the typical baby blue room with sweet teddy bears, monkeys, or you name it- animals. I came across this blanket from Bed, Bath, & Beyond online and instantly was in love! I never know exactly what I am looking for until I see my first piece of inspiration, and for Logan's nursery this was it! I am a little bummed I didn't buy this blanket when I saw it, so unfortunately we don't even have it! But it was the inspiration piece none the less! When I found out we were having a boy, I was so excited to get started on his nursery! I knew I wanted it to be an extremely bright and fun room, and I think that was accomplished. :) I decided to do happy monsters, not scary ones! I still have people look at me funny when I say that Logan's nursery theme is monsters! Hasn't anyone seen Monsters Inc? They can be friendly! :)

Took me a little while, but I found a bedding set that I fell in love with and ordered it right away. I ordered several extra crib sheets too so I could make many of the things in his room to match his bedding. Here is his bedding, thank you Target! We decided not to use bumpers this time around based on the new recommendations for SIDS safety by the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Time to pick out paint colors! Remember I said I wanted it to be bright? I was not kidding, I really meant BRIGHT! I know there are some people who based on color theory research say it is not good to paint a childs room orange, but I went ahead and did it anyhow! (I even wrote an 8 page paper on this subject in high school!) I will let you know how Logan turns out! Haha :)

Once the bedding arrived I got to work on deigning the accent wall. Here is the design I came up with!

Time to get started! This wall took me about 5 days to do. I was pregnant while I painted it so I chose to take my time and only paint one color a day. With my doctor's permission, wearing a mask & with the windows wide open I was only in the room for 5 minutes, 3x a day. :) My sweet husband always measures out the accent walls for me, otherwise these never would have turned out looking like squares!

I added one color of squares each day!

I looked around for a mobile but could not find one I liked, so I decided I could just make one! This was a really time consuming project, but I am really happy with how it turned out. I sewed fabric around embroidery hoops and scrunched the fabric to get the look I was going for.

I cut out all the monsters out of felt and got started stuffing & hand stitching them all together. I used some ribbon to put the whole mobile together and we hung it from the ceiling over his crib. He really loves it!

Here they are finished!

A friend was giving this chair away on Facebook (thanks Jamie!) and I quickly asked if I could have it! I have always wanted this chair from Ikea, but had completely forgotten that I now have the perfect room for it to live in! I was so tickled with how well it matched Logan's room! I made a little cushion for it because it just looked like it needed one! I took scrape pieces of fabric I had leftover from sewing the curtains, and sewed them all together with ribbon in between. It was a quick and easy project that makes it look like the chair was made for Logan's room, I love it! Plus now its a little more comfy for the kids to sit in, and they love to sit and spin in it!

The part I was most excited about was the artwork for the room! My Husband said he would paint the pictures and I couldn't wait! It was the main way I had planned to incorporate the monster theme into his room. We did all the artwork to match the mobile monsters I had created, I love that they match!

Here is how they turned out! I painted the two small ones and William painted the two big ones! :)

I found this idea on Pinterest, my favorite place to waste just about all of my time! ;) I bought the letters at Michaels on sale and painted them with the leftover paint from the accent wall, so they would match exactly. The shelves are actually spice racks from Ikea for only $3 each. They came in a neutral color so I just spray painted them black to go with everything else in the room. I did a DIY blog post on this project already, you can see it here. Fun random note, that Tickle Monster book is my very favorite book ever I think! Love how it portrays monsters in a friendly manner rather than all the things out there that make monsters seem scary! We love monsters here in our home! :)

Are you ready to finally see how it all looks together? Take a peek!

I sewed these curtains out of the extra crib sheets I had ordered, and used red ribbon for the edging. They are backed with the blackout fabric so when they are closed it is nice and dark for naps & bedtime.

I made this changing table pad cover out of a soft fleece, I would have loved to have just bought one but they didn't have any color that looked good in the room. Turns out I was happy to not have bought one because these are the easiest things ever to make and I did it for so much cheaper!

Here is my little cutie enjoying his room! It is time to move the mattress down now, its amazing how fast he is growing up!

Hope you enjoyed seeing his nursery, so much love went into making this room! I spend a lot of time in Logan's nursery, and it makes all the hard work seem worth it! I hope Logan loves it as he grows up!

Please leave a comment and let me know what you think! :)