Miss Elizabeth's Garden Party

A garden party seemed to be the perfect theme for Ellie's third birthday party. After all, what is cuter than little girls sipping tea (pink lemonade) and nibbling on little treats. Since we live in Miami, the end of December turned out to be the perfect timing as far as the weather was concerned. It was fun being able to have a summer-themed birthday for my little winter baby.

Loving all the colors.

The pink creme puffs (you can kind of see them here) were just from Costco and then I dipped them in pink Wilton candy melts to match the theme.

These fun paper flowers announce the theme of the party perfectly and the guests excited for a garden party. The template for the invitations can be found here.

The pinata template was from the Pottery Barn Kids tutorial.

The burlap banner was really simple to make. Just a variety of ribbons and lace from my mom and grandma's old stock plus a few coordinating ribbons from the party.

I wasn't quite sure how to hang the instagrams since I didn't have two trees where I needed them. So you'd better believe I had my husband dismantling our bed the morning of the party so I could use the foot board. He's a good sport.

Little party guests chatting and sipping tea (okay, it was pink lemonade).

I saw a cake very similar to this on Pinterest a while back and basically recreated it to the best of my memory. It was definitely my favorite party of the party.

Easy no sew tutus. Each tutu took 2 rolls of the 25 yd 6" wide tulle. I cut each strip to 24" and just used safety pins to size them to each girl.

This overhanging canopy was really fun and simple to make. I think it turned out better than the one I used as inspiration from Pottery Barn Kids. I bought the top wreath on clearance at Joanne's for less than $10. The sheer white is actually a curtain set from Ikea for $5. I just hot glued the curtains as I gathered them tightly around the wreath. I strung three ribbons through the top and gathered them in the center to hang it from.

The lace on the tables are vintage pieces from my grandmother's collection when she was younger.

I used the extra tulle from the tutus to decorate the back of the chairs.

White gloves add an extra dainty touch.

The birthday girl happily modeling her tiara. I mostly used the Bleu Bird tutorial for the tiaras and then attached coordinating ribbons to the back.

Another Pinterest find. I had seen these cake pops somewhere before and recreated them as best as I could remember. The butterflies were made with fondant and little butterfly fondant cutters I found on ebay.

These perfect little wildflower teacups are from Distinctive Decor.

The presents decorated to match the theme made a fun party of the display.

Chocolate covered Oreos are becoming a staple at my party as guests love the taste and are always  in awe over how fancy they look. I used the Oreo molds and a lace chocolate transfer sheet for these ones. I always make these a couple weeks before the party since the last so well so I can focus on other details closer to the party.

The fruit kabobs were one of the biggest hits with the kids. I used the Wilton star fondant cutters for the watermelon.

Pinata time!

Twirling around the pinata with their ribbon wands. The ribbon wands I made with wand sticks and coordinating party ribbon.

More sugar and of course necklaces for the little ladies.

This cute little pink ruffle cake was SO simple to make. Check out this quick youtube tutorial for simple instructions on the ruffle cake. One thing I did before adding the ruffles was marked vertical lines every inch around the whole cake as a guide for the ribbons. I would guess I ended up using  4-5 pounds of buttercream frosting to decorate it!

I made all the treats for the party with the exception of the macaroons and petite fours which were ordered from a little French bakery near our house, Chocolate Fashion.

We used some of the flowers from the arrangements we made to decorate the cake.

The birthday girl pleased to be the center of attention.

The kids all had fun twirling their ribbon wands in their tutus.

Lace tablecloth from my grandmother as well as the two vases on this table.

 I scooped up the ice cream cups in advance with the cuisipro scoop.

I topped each scoop of ice cream with a raspberry and mint leaf.

 

 

We waited until the party guests (with the exception of cousins who flew in for the party) had left to open presents.

 

These little party poppers were made out of tissue paper and and old wrapping paper roll cut down to about 3" segments. I tied off one end, stuffed it with little strawberry puffs and then tied off the other end with twine. We layed one out with each place setting.

Instagrams hung with twine and small clothes pins as a back drop to the treats table.

I kept the 'Thank You' bags super simple. The tags were just something I had in my scrapbooking collection that I stamped the letters onto and then tied them up with twine.

Holy Birthday Cake, Batman!

This Batman Party was by far my favorite ever to plan. Kenny was also eagerly helping me plan out his personal touches in the months leading up to the party. I wanted to stick to a more traditional batman theme so we incorporated lots of old original comic book pictures I had purchased on Ebay and also stuck to the tradition blue and yellow coloring.

Where to start?....the batman posters I just purchased cheap on Amazon to use as backdrops. The frames are just cheap poster frames from Wal Mart.
The cake pop stands I actually made out of 8x8 square cake dummys and and the symbols were cut out with the Batman Cricut cartridge.
The Skyline boxes were from Potter Barn Kids when they went on clearance.
The flat white platters are from CB2.
The pennant and circle banners I made out of cardstock and old vintage comics I ordered on Ebay in a big lot. I believe I cut them to 7x9 inches.

This cake was so much fun! The were modeled after Kenny's favorite Batman toys he plays with and the inspiration for the cake design as well as most of this party was from the Party Dress blog. Definitely some good stuff going on over there!
The cupcakes were simple enough. For the fondant toppers I used my batman wing cutter I found on Ebay and just cut the BAM! and POW! circles by hand. The wrappers were just standard wrappers I cut out, but the designs were also from the Batman Cricut Cartridge. 

The candy cones I made by rolling up 6x6 inch card stock and hot gluing them to extra large sucker sticks found at Michael's.
The cake pops were just standard with fondant molded as I went to get the effect I wanted. This design was also inspired by the Party Dress blog.

I always love to make my own treats, but you can also order a much more professional looking version of these chocolate covered oreos from Sweeties by Kim on Etsy. The tutorial I used to make these can be found HERE.

Family shot with Ellie poking her eyes out...

For the Thank you table (inspired by The Party Dress) I made the Kenny banner using just the Batman Cricut Cartridge.  I bought coordinating candy from a local wholesaler and offered the guests cellophane bags to fill as they left with their Batman prize buckets.

These cake toppers were cut out with the Batman Cricut cartridge

A couple months before the party I had snapped a couple shots of Kenny in his batman costume for the backdrop.

This was my first attempt at making sugar cookies with royal icing. It was very time consuming, but I was pleased enough with the results. Sweet Sugar Belle teaches you everything you could ever possible want to know about baking and decorating sugar cookies.
Then fun comic fabric runner I used came from True Legends Fabric store online.

I found the little Batman buckets for the 'thank you' table at Target, the wristbands and batarangs from Party City. I ordered the gum balls from Oh! Nuts and the coordinating sixlets from a local wholesale candy shop here in Miami. The candy jars are from Ikea.

I made the little extra cake on this table just to add balance and a little more color. The paper toppers I made with the Batman Brave and Bold Cricut cartridge.

These block letters were one of my favorite decorations at the party. I ordered paper mache letters from Create for Less and then just cut out the old comic books I ordered on Ebay and attached the sheets with mod podge.

My mom whipped up all these black capes for the kids. The batwings were painted on with yellow fabric paint.

The Villain Stomp
We did a Villain Stomp in lieu of a pinata this year. My husband blew up about 80 balloons stuffed with little candies. The kids were told they were the Villains and once they killed the Villain (stomped the balloon) they would get their reward.

More fun Batman cupcakes. The batman fondant cutouts were from a cutter I found on Ebay. The Batman and Joker faces in the background were from the cricut cartrige I cut out.

Blowing out the birthday candles. The mask he is wearing in this picture is just a cheapo one my mom found at Wal Mart.

I was SO excited to surprise the birthday boy with this dedicated Batman bouncer for the party. I found it here in from D&F Bouncers in Miami.

I cut these felt masks out using this free template here.

The invitations were one of my favorite touches to the party. All the cutouts were with the Cricut Batman cartridge except the skyline, which I used the Plantin' Schoobook cartrige for. The background of the inner center was from the old comic books I ordered on Ebay.

Magical Elf on the Shelf Snowflake Breakfast

This cute little elf finally came out of hiding bringing lots of goodies and smiles with him. A snowflake themed breakfast with lots of mini breakfast treats suited Marco Polo's introduction perfectly. Ken and Ellie were so excited to wake up to this little breakfast and were so adorable checking out all the goods and enjoying them throughout the day. They were particularly excited about their little name cards and place settings. I just love seeing them get so excited about the holidays.

Marco Polo brought lots of mini elf breakfast treats with him including powder sugar donuts, mini bagels with swirled whipped cream, mini yogurt cups with granola, candy cane marshmallows, mini pancakes, mini cinnamon rolls and pastries.  Oh, and of course chocolate milk with whipping cream to top all the goodness off.

The little hanging "snowflakes" are cotton balls on fishing line.