Pink Peppermint Blogger

Most people don’t think of a wild party when throwing a first birthday, but the one I am sharing with you today totally fits the bill. In just a few weeks’ time I helped my friend, Gina, pull together a celebration for her little boy, Davis. I think you’ll agree it came together great! Here’s the invitation.

It read, “Want to hear something WILD? Our little tiger is having a birthday. Please join us as we celebrate…”

Here’s the welcome sign, which I confess makes me giggle. Every. Time. For those of you who weren’t feeling old enough today, that song was released a quarter century ago. Sigh.

I digress. Back to the party! When guests arrived, they received these pith helmets for later backyard exploration.

Here’s mom and Davis, the birthday boy now! Cutie pie.

They had the snack plan all mapped out with wild safari goodies. I am loving that grass table skirt!

They served Monkey Munch (banana chips), Tiger Tails (Cheetos), Chocolate-Covered Ants (Chocolate Raisins), Jungle Juice and more!

Big sister is keeping a watchful eye over the Zebra Cakes. Smart girl!

Here’s a closer look at the cupcakes and toppers–monkeys and tigers with giraffe and zebra prints.

Party goers snacked and played. They enjoyed a round of jungle golf and played Elefun, a silly game where butterflies flutter out of an elephant’s trunk and the kids try to catch them with nets. They later threw on their pith helmets, and the party dads led them on a nature walk.

Then, it was time for cake! How totally adorable is this smash cake?

Friends went home with these appropriately-themed reusable bags filled with goodies–the tiger and elephant motifs a subtle nod to the two teams of the household. Inside were animal masks and tails, animal paddle ball sets, temporary tattoos and animal crackers!

The favor tags read, “No lion, that was WILD!”

Thanks to Gina for sharing these beautiful pictures from her family’s special day. Happy birthday big boy!

Here’s a look at the custom safari collection I created with Gina for Davis’ party.

This includes invitations and favor tags, a party banner, write-in menu cards, double-sided cupcake toppers, welcome sign and party hat.

Watch for this collection to be added to the online store soon!

I’ve got quite a few parties that I’ve been meaning to share with you. Since we are getting into the thick of wedding season, first up is this beautiful summertime 50th Wedding Anniversary celebration my sister and her family threw for her in-laws.

When we first began discussing the party, and looking around for supplies, I’d have to say we were both underwhelmed by the product offerings specific to the Golden Anniversary. There is, what I would call, a big opening in the marketplace for tasteful 50th anniversary party goods and accessories. Martha, if you’re reading this, we’d love to see what you can do with bringing some gorgeous options to a store near you. Or me.

No worries, though. We knew we’d have to get a little more creative with the decorations and the use of the color gold throughout. Both of my sister’s in-laws are retired educators. Her father-in-law was an administrator and taught biology, and her mother-in-law is a local historian. History lending itself ever so slightly more toward this kind of party in a small historic New England town, we decided on a “50 years of history” theme. The party was held at a local historic mansion designed in the 1850s with lovely details and beautiful grounds.

Isn’t this a great location to celebrate a couple’s history? Here’s a look at the invitation I created.

Guests were welcomed into the home by this beautiful door treatment. I love how the garland traces the shape of the door and the initial detail on the wreath.

This is one of my favorite details!

The buffet and bar were set up inside, while they took advantage of the gorgeous grounds for seating.

Muted gold and ivory linens added to the feel of this “golden” celebration and worked well with the yellow and ivory flowers in over-sized gold mint julep cups.

A note of caution. My sister had ordered pale yellow roses online in bulk from a wholesaler for the party. Without warning, they substituted yellow rose of Texas colored flowers, which clashed with the gold vases. WHAT? Many of those ended up on the kids’ table, but she was able to buy enough pale yellow and ivory roses locally to mix in with those she had ordered. I think the arrangements turned out beautifully!

Since it was a casual family affair, the kiddos had their own pint-sized table, complete with bubbles and coloring books to keep them happy and occupied.

Looks like it worked!

Inside friends and family viewed a slide show of photos from the last 50 years. Outside, they enjoyed food and drink and had a good time catching up while listening to hit music from the year the couple married. Then, they turned their attention to the main event. Cake!

But first, our historian honoree took a moment to share the historical relevance of the mansion and the grounds the guests were enjoying!

Then it was time to bring out the cake. This three-tiered beauty included one layer of her favorite, carrot cake, one layer of his favorite, chocolate, and then yellow cake for the remainder.

50 years! A golden chapter in the history book.

Today, I thought I’d share this custom piece I just finished a few weeks ago for a sweet little paper boy who’s turning one! His mom is going with a sort of vintage newspaper theme and asked if I could come up with some invitation options. She supplied this totally adorable picture of her little man, complete with paper boy cap. Swoon. Isn’t he a doll?

I seriously want to eat him up. I played around with several invitation options, some more design-driven and less newspaperesque than others. In the end, it was this straight-laced, traditional layout and journalistic style of copy that won out. I think it’s playful and unexpected, which sort of makes the whole invitation a bit more whimsical, no? What do you think?

So happy to finally get around to sharing these pictures from a sweet Springtime birthday party! My friend, Gina, did this adorable carnival themed party that everyone is always asking about for her daughter’s first birthday. For her second, they celebrated her birthday Easter-style with an adorable petting zoo and a good-old fashioned egg hunt.

Here’s the invitation I created for the big day.

Gina made this moss “A” for the door to greet the party goers. Love.

Here’s the beautiful buffet table filled with all sorts of adorable goodness.

Like these sweet bunny sandwiches. If you’ve ever attempted sandwiches with cookie cutters then you know this wasn’t easy. If not, it’s much harder than you might think!

And how sweet are these carrot silverware treatments? So festive!

I love the natural neutrals of the bristle bottle brush bunnies with the bright colors of Spring here.

After getting rained out the previous year, Gina was brave enough to try her luck with another outdoor party and, boy, did this one ever pay off! Loving all that green.

Here’s a close-up of the centerpiece–Spring branches hung with decorative eggs!

Gina used these natural cups with lids from Think Garnish and decorated them with these little cottontails. No spill!

I love this decorative galvanized accent too. So bright and fun!

Here’s the birthday girl, Ava, getting ready to eat. I adore those cabbage leaf chargers!

The entertainment was a traveling petting zoo. The children were able to pet the goats, ducks and bunnies too!

Ava and her dad got up close and personal with this snuggly little bunny.

Here’s a peek at the birthday girl’s little smash cake.  So sweet and simple. Love the fondant tag detail with the writing.

Guests took home their eggs and a pair of these adorable bunny britches stuffed full of goodies.

The tag read, “I’ve been on the hunt for a sweet friend like you!”

A beautiful day for a beautiful girl turning 2. Can’t wait to share pictures from another party Gina is hosting soon. It’ll be wild. Stay tuned!

Lauren and I are working up some first birthday fun for her youngest son! I swear it seems like a couple of months ago that we were throwing this sip and see for those two, and now he’s almost one! I seriously don’t know where the time goes. As always, Lauren is sure to dazzle with her adorable ideas and keen attention to the smallest detail. This year’s festivities will be centered around a backyard egg hunt.

Here’s a peek at the invitations, just delivered! I love the craft envelopes.

Being an April baby, Spring is my fave time of year, so I am a touch giddy to see how it all turns out. Stay tuned…

It occurs to me how much design work, particularly custom design work that you never get to see because it might not be the invitation my client chooses, or just because I’m moving so feverishly that I don’t take the time I should to show you. I’m going to try my best to show you what I’ve been up to and hope to sometimes share pictures of client parties when they are available.

I have a wonderful lady that I’ve worked with for a couple of years now. She came to me online after seeing Lauren’s son’s bug party. She is full of exuberance and fun ideas for celebrating her kids’ birthdays. Her enthusiasm is catching, and Lauren and I have had the pleasure of doing several party plans for her. The latest was for her daughter, Maddee’s 3rd birthday celebration. These custom design options may look familiar. They were completed around the same time as the vintage fishing invitations I worked on. They have some of the same design elements and a bit of a throwback feel.

We tossed around a few ideas all centering around a petting zoo. We had all but landed on a County Fair theme. The only hangup was that her daughter was hoping for some sort of princess element, as almost three-year-old girls are prone to do. Because it was in the fall, we were able to play around with angles like the party being a Harvest Festival, the party activities being things you’d do and see at a local fair, and the birthday girl being “crowned” the festival princess to satisfy that element of her party wishes. I also tried some poster-style versions, being the time of year the fair comes to town. Here are the invitation options I designed.

I can tell you which version of the invitation they went with for the party, but first I’d like to hear which is your favorite. I’m trying to decide which options to add to the online store. So let me hear about which you like best and why.

A few months back, Emily came to me through mutual friends I’d worked with. She had a fishing-themed birthday in mind to celebrate her son, Jack’s 4th birthday and their life-long love of the water. Her desire to use family photos and heirloom fishing items drove the vintage look and feel. After much searching, she decided she wasn’t going to find what she had in mind for invitations, so we talked about some custom options. Here are a few of the versions I created for her.

This last one was the one Emily decided on. She felt it best incorporated her “Hooked on 4″ idea.

Enjoy the pictures Emily shared and the party details as told by her!

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We have a pond in our backyard and we often walk down to feed the fish and just play around in the water. Jack loves being outside, playing in the dirt, picking up worms and of course “hooking” up anything he can scoop up in his net. I also share the same passion for being outdoors and close to the water. I am from the Coast, and my Dad’s parents always had us on the water!

When I began tossing the idea around as a possibility,  I thought it would be fun to incorporate some of our family heirloom pictures, cane poles and cast nets that belonged to both my Granddaddy and Papa. I started to think of colors and wanted to create a vintage, simple, classic look.

After shopping around on the internet and in and out of stationery stores, I remembered Pink Peppermint’s wonderful creations! Eleanor helped bring my idea to life and the party was fabulous! We had a fish fry to celebrate “our fly guy” and I put snack chips in an old fishing basket – “fish and chips.”

We also served boiled shrimp and smoked tuna dip. For our non-seafood guest, we served corn dip, party sandwiches and cupcakes, of course!

I had a galvanized oval tub and filled it with water and plastic fish. I attached a mini tin bucket to a cane pole with fishing line to scoop up the fish for a fun activity!

I decorated these mason jars with red raffia and had Swedish fish and gummy worms for their “fresh catch” or their “live bait”…This was a huge hit!  There wasn’t a fish or gummy worm left over!!!

Adorable party, Emily! Thanks for letting me be involved, and a happy 4th year to Jack! I think as the weather continues to warm up, this is a great theme to keep in mind for spring and summer months too!

I’m happy to report that despite the two weeks I had to put this party together, my daughter’s 4^th birthday was a smashing success! We invited some friends over to decorate candy houses.  Here’s the invitation.

I decorated the doors with paper medallions turned wrapped candy and made lollipops out of twisty balloons for the planters.

Inside, we set the scene with a candy house village made from cardboard gift boxes and decorated with candy.

I made the banner using scrapbook paper backed with felt and strung on candy necklaces. It read, “Happy 4^th Sweet Caroline.”

I used these cupcake wrappers topped off with peppermints to hide the hooks we hung it with! It turned out to be one of my favorite little details!

Now, goodness knows I am inclined to try some ridiculous things for party’s sake, but I know my limits. There was no way I was going to attempt to make 20 some odd gingerbread or graham cracker houses to decorate. No. Way. That is precisely the sort of effort that would have me in tears at 2 a.m. and wanting to pull my hair out.  Not gonna do it.

I bought these gable boxes from the bakery section at Michael’s, added a roof and lined the window with yellow tissue paper. Lauren put them together for me, God bless her. She adhered them to 10 inch cake bases decorated with Washi tape in our party colors—radish red, pale pink, lime green and sky blue–and she added silver pipe cleaner trim to the cardboard base. I thought they looked pretty cute even without the candy!  Having never worked with Washi tape before, I was thrilled with its ability to be repositioned and the ease of use. I can’t wait to figure out other party applications!  I ordered mine from leboxboutique on Etsy.

Each kiddo got their own bottle of royal icing, or as we called it Sugar cement.

There was an assortment of candy on each table. I tried to avoid overuse of Christmas colors because my daughter was born on Dec 27, so I try to be sure and make her birthday feel like a separate event. Given the time of year, I was able to find lots of candy in red and green. I added some pink and blue to the mix. We used M&Ms, holiday Lifesavers, pastel Starlight mints, pink and green peppermint sticks, spice drops, sugar wafers in vanilla, strawberry and chocolate, milk chocolate rocks, fruit loops, mini Nilla wafers, marshmallow ropes, lollipops, Hershey bars, gingerbread snowmen and trees, and even some gummy penguins!

Here’s the birthday girl hard at work on her candy house masterpiece!

If I ever host this event again, I’d either buy mini gumdrops or skip them altogether. They were heavy and wanted to slide off before the icing set. I’d also buy more sugar wafers. Lots more! The kids were funny. They’d each chosen their materials and then it was madness if they couldn’t finish that wall, door or rooftop like they’d started it. Here’s some of the kids’ handiwork.

They were all very proud of their work!

After they’d finished their masterpieces (and eaten way too much candy), we put the candy house aside to give them time to set up before our guests left. Then, we broke out the real food.

I am a fool for brunch foods, and since it was early on a Saturday, we did ChicFila chicken minis, sausage balls, pinwheels, mini cinnamon rolls, yogurt covered snowflake pretzels, sweet breads, and fresh fruit. We served coffee and, for the kids, a frothy pink punch made with raspberry sorbet, cranberry juice and gingerale.

Candy bracelet napkin rings!

These cups are my new go-to for beverage service.

Nothing Earth-shattering, but I think they are versatile for any theme, easy to dress up with straws like these I used from Shop Sweet Lulu or a themed cup wrap, and the lids makes them great for kids. It’s also fun to do a straw flag for guests to write their names on so drinks don’t get mixed up.

And then it was time for cupcakes! I ordered half chocolate and half vanilla from a local bakery, Cakes and Candles, and added these adorable fondant toppers from Edible Details. Brittany did an assortment of color combinations based on our party scheme. Love!

It was a great time! Everyone really did seem to have fun, and it made me smile to see how tickled each child was with his/her candy house creation! If you’ve always wanted to host a gingerbread house party but were hesitant to bake or buy all those houses, I highly recommend this fun and easy alternative. Happy 4th Sweet Caroline!

Last weekend some friends and I threw a sip and see for our neighbor, Christy, and her new baby boy, Bennett. Fall is her favorite time of year and since they both share October as their birthday month, I thought a Little Pumpkin theme would be fun! Here’s the invitation.

I whipped up this quick letter “b” wreath for baby Bennett’s debut. It was super easy to make with a letter form, a hot glue gun and some Spanish moss.

We had the party at our neighbor Sherry’s house. She made this fabulous diaper cake to be used as the centerpiece on the main buffet table. We used burlap and orange throughout.

Polka dot paper pumpkin lanterns hung above the table,

and a double-sided burlap banner reading “Welcome Bennett” hung in the archway.

The silverware came right out of the pumpkin patch!

In keeping with our Fall theme, we went mostly with warm and savory dishes. There were lots of hot dips on hand. We also had a great hot apple cider.

There were some tasty sweets on hand too like these pumpkin-themed petit fours and some crazy good pumpkin pie dip from Pinterest served with apple slices and graham crackers. Look it up. Seriously.

There’s the little pumpkin now! Sweet baby. So glad you’re here, Baby Bennett!

Another year has flown past and my first born is now six! This year was a big deal for us. We’ve always had birthday celebrations at home, but the birthday boy requested we have his party at a local bouncy house place, and after the pressure from last year of styling the party compounded with getting the house in order for entertaining, I readily gave in. I am used to having days (if I want or need) to hang things and play around with placement of party decor, but this year I’d have only 30 minutes. While I was making the decorations, I just kept repeating it to myself. 30 minutes. 30 minutes.

He wanted an Angry Birds party like his cousin had. Since there is not much available in the way of licensed partyware, I knew we’d be making a lot of it ourselves. I think this is what helped to make the party seem special and one-of-a-kind even though we were going the whole party package route. Here’s the invitation we used. You may know that I’m a sucker for a clever verse. This may be one of my favorites!

“Just who are these birds and why are they sore?

‘Cause those pigs stole their eggs! It’s happened before.

Revenge is a dish best served cold.

Come celebrate! Reese is turning six years old!”

The entry to the bouncy place is a little hard to pick out, so we marked the doorway with these mylar balloons, AB-style. I thought these might hold up better outside than the standard latex ones.

There are two party rooms and two gift tables, so we made sure everyone knew where to go with these Angry Birds balloons I made using these downloadable templates from The Party Animal.

The balloons were weighted with a nest full of golden eggs being guarded by the blue Angry Bird.

I made this sign for the party room with a small poster I scored at Dollar Tree.

We used bright Angry Birds colors for the paper plates chargers, napkins and drinks. The food went on smaller clear plates to let the birds’ and pig faces show through.

Polka dot napkins were done up Angry Birds-style with googly eyes, furrowed brows, and even a few pig noses.

Here’s the birthday boy’s special seat with a crown like the pig king’s.

At each place there was also a pair of Angry Bird or Pig glasses.

These turned out hilarious. The kids thought so too!

The party was mid-afternoon so we kept the food light, serving chicken nuggets, fruit skewers and these grody giant gummy fried eggs, the surprise hit of the party!

The fruit was skewered on these funny little guys.

They look more menacing in numbers, no?

Here’s our “Happy Angry Birdsday” banner above the main table.

The party table was set up with scenes from the game.

Here’s the awesome cake made by Kristen of Crumb Gourmet in Jackson.

There’s my big boy making his birthday wish. We found him a shirt with the black Angry Bird on it that said, “I’m the bomb!” Hehe. Angry Birds humor.

These were the other surprise hit of the day–WalMart bouncy balls that I drew Angry Birds faces on. We turned them loose in the jump area with these, and the kids were all over them!

We had an assortment of favors in these Angry Birds bags, which were also made with The Party Animal’s templates and printed on labels for easy application.

Each had some combination of the following favors included candy tubes filled with gumballs or mini gumball Angry Bird eggs, water bomb slingshots, wind-up toucans, stickers and golden egg silly putty. They also each got to take home their pair of bird of pig glasses.

Happy Angry Birdsday to my favorite 6-year-old!

If you like what you see here, check out this summertime Angry Birds Splash Party!