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 Trip to the Sweet Shoppe!

In the previous post I shared a lot of pictures of all the prep it took to get ready for Lola's Sweet Shoppe... the invitations, decorations, candy etc. if you missed it check out the complete party here! I just wanted to post a few photos of Lola and her friends enjoying the party. She really had a great time and thank you to all who came to celebrate with us!

Lola's Sweet Shoppe Party!

Its finally here! Lola had her 2nd birthday party last weekend! We had a great time! :) I started thinking about the theme of her party in August... I like to have a lot of time to plan for her parties. Thanks to a friend of mine on Facebook, (Sarah...thank you!) I was pointed in the direction for our party that her sister had just done for her daughter... a Sweet Shoppe! I know Lola is pretty young, and she has never really had much candy, but I couldn't resist planning this party that looked like so much fun! I started immediately scouring the web for pictures of candy buffets, invites, and decorations... apparently this is a pretty popular party idea right now-probably because its so tasty. :) I decided quite quickly that I preferred the buffets that stuck to a color scheme, I just think they look more cohesive. I took Lola outside on a beautiful sunny day all dressed up to get the picture for her invitation. The only thing I didn't account for is her not enjoying the taste of the lollipop- I really thought she'd love it! Most of the pictures after her first taste or two were hilarious, she just thought it was gross! Here is us just having some picture taking fun!

Now that we picked our theme, I wanted to get started on the invitations right away. Lola and I searched high and low to find the lollipop (or Lolapop as Lola calls it!) I wanted to use in the picture on her invite, they are not as easy to find as you might think.... unless you want it rainbow colored! After several days and 10 candy stores, we found one that would work. For the invitations we have used the same company for two years and they are just the best! They will customize any card and they are so prompt with their service! Super impressed! Go to Lilduckduck to check it out yourself! Here is how the invitations turned out! (Sorry I had to block out some of our personal information.)

I had a hard time picking the color scheme for this party because I think so many different colors could be a lot of fun...but finally I decided to go with pink and orange. I have loved this color combo for a while now, so I went for it! I started by picking up the ribbon at several different stores that matched with our colors. I love ribbon! I think it adds a lot to a party and its relatively cheap. Here is what we came up with!

I saw these giant lollipops and knew I wanted to make them! Thanks to my hubby who helped me put them together...he drilled holes first so we could insert the dowels straight, it worked perfect!

To make the lollipops you just wrap the styrofoam with any colored tissue paper and then cover it with celephane. I wrapped the dowels with pink duck tape and then just tied on a big pretty bow! Here is the final product!

Now for one of the most important aspects of a candy buffet, the candy! I looked online at bulk candy companies for a while and just couldnt justify the amount of money it was going to cost to have all the candy shipped. I finally came across Oh Nuts! They have resonably priced candy as well as shipping. They were super prompt and the candy arrived perfect! Lola was so excited when all the candy landed on our doorstep! I couldnt believe how well she understood and accepted that we couldn't open any of the bags of candy until her party.

Here are the photos from the big day!

My Mom and I made this "Lola's Sweet Shoppe" banner using her Cricut paper cutting machine.

Here is Lola and I! :) She was so happy to finally eat some of the yummy candy! The food and drinks were set up in the kitchen, but I forgot to take a picture once we had all the food set out. :(

The candy buffet!

I found these adorable bags at Display & Costume. The kids were given a different bag to load with candy and then put them into these cute tote bags along with their cookies, pixie sticks, and such.

Yep, we really gave out toothbrushes as favors! :) Below are some pictures of all the jars I found to hold the candy. I found several at Walmart, a few at Target, and my Mom found some at Tuesday Morning.

Here are the kiddos treat bags all filled up! My Mom also found these adorable candy soaps for me to put in the bathroom. I definitely inherited my love for decorating and going on the hunt for all items that work within my theme from her!

And last but certainly not least, Lola the party girl! I really tried to not go overboard on her party (Even though Tori Spelling is my party planning inspiration...have you seen her kiddos parties?!) I think its safe to say that if I had a dollar for every time someone mentioned to me while I was planning this party that Lola is only two and she will not even remember it, I probably could have paid for the entire party! :) I know she will most likely not remember it, but I will! I had such a great time making this my hobby for the last few months! Going shopping for all the supplies with Lola and seeing her and her friends enjoyment at the party was great! She is still talking about her party and that is what makes me happy! :) Hope you enjoyed seeing our very sweet party! Stay tuned for a post with pictures from the party!

*Thanks to everyone who helped me make this party happen! I wanted to mention that while I found many of my ideas from several different blogs, the one I referred to the most was Grace's Candy Party, Check out her blog for some really fun ideas! :)