Pink Peppermint Blogger

I’m excited to have gotten my amazing photos back from my sweet friend, Rachel, and to have finally gotten through all of them so that I can share my daughter’s Barbie: The Princess and The Popstar birthday party with you all. The movie is a classic “grass is greener” tale of a princess and a popstar who each think the other’s life is so fantastic that they trade places for a day and learn some valuable lessons along the way. Hey, I could write DVD sleeve copy. My Sweet Caroline was introduced to the movie by some neighborhood friends and quickly became obsessed with being “Keira,” the popstar.

Here’s the invitation and the envelope in which it was delivered. We kept the guest list to a few girlfriends and invited them to come in costume for an on-stage performance.

Most of them were hand-delivered in the neighborhood so we were able to embellish them a bit.

We kept things simple with the party entrance this time, opting for a sparkly door sign and some backstage credentials.

Backstage passes hung from a guitar stand on the front porch. I wasn’t happy with the materials I found for ID badges at the local office store, so I printed 4×6 cards and had them hard laminated, adding a lanyard to each.

When guests entered, our Stage Moms were directed to the left into the “Green Room.” We had earplugs on hand just to be silly. Purple, of course.

Our “Talent” was directed through the lit doorway to the concert stage.

We also had directional signage for the “Green Room,” “Wardrobe” and this one for the bathroom.

C’mon. That’s funny.

There are my kiddos “tuning” the inflatable guitar before the party started. This is the only photo I have of my son at the party because he hightailed it down to the neighbor’s house when he heard he’d be outnumbered.

We built the stage with a piece of plywood and some scrap wood from our playset.

I painted it purple and added a short shimmery curtain to hide the legs. It fit right over the fireplace hearth, and gave the girls a few square feet of room to get their popstar on.

We covered the fireplace and mantel with pink and purple goodness and lit it up with Christmas lights.

Overhead was an over-sized tree ornament we used as a disco ball. It even had a pink tiara on its head.

Guests passed from the stage area to the “Green Room” through this sparkly pink curtain, which was a source of great entertainment for the girls.

(Read: they ran back and forth through it until it bit the dust.)

We kept the food light with items you might find in a real Green Room.

Maria from Love & Sugar Kisses made these AMAZING fondant topped Oreos for us. I swear to you that they were so perfect, people felt bad biting into them. Ha!

The pink Princess versions featured crowns and magic hairbrushes and the purple Popstar versions had guitars and magic microphones.

Since most everyone walked to the party, we offered mimosas to our stage moms. In keeping with our color scheme (and because I don’t really love a classic mimosa) we mixed 1 part champagne or sparkling juice, 1 part orange juice and 1 part V8 Fusion Pomegranate Blueberry juice. The concoction was a beautiful pink color, and the sweetness of the different juice really cut the usual bite of the drink. Two thumbs up.

The girls drank regular juice out of these easier to handle cups.

I made this centerpiece for around $10, wrapping boxes with matching table coverings and using inexpensive princess and popstar props from a party store.

I told the birthday girl she could eat when her guests arrived, so five minutes in, she was ready to chow down.

The girls ate and then took their time warming up to the stage. We had a small craft area where they could make “rock band” bracelets using stickers, rhinestones and leather wrist bands.

I was sure if the parents made themselves scarce, the girls would be fighting tooth and nail for a turn so I made these names to draw from to see who was next. As it turned out, they were pretty shy about getting up there. Who knew? We had a karaoke machine with songs from Barbie: The Princess and The Popstar movie and other faves the girls could choose from like “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” and “Call Me Maybe.”

Everyone wanted to be on stage, but very few wanted to sing alone. Safety in numbers. That’s my girl at the mic rockin’ and rulin’.

They had cake, the birthday girl made her wish and everyone took the stage again.

When it was time to head home, everyone left with one of these light-up wands, which I thought looked a lot like microphones.

I hoped they would sing into them in the mirror like we used to do as kids!

The tags said, “You royally ROCKED it, girl. You really did your thing. Take home this magic mic, look in the mirror and SING!”

After the party, I snapped a pic of Caroline in her purple Keira wig and we used the photo on these hilarious thank you notes, designed to look like autographed headshots.

Every time I look at them, I laugh all over again.

My baby is five. Wow. When did that happen?

Special thanks to Caroline’s Nana and Mrs. Lauren, as usual, for their hands-on help and party inspiration, and a special thanks to Mrs. Stacy for taking me in her giant truck to the home improvement store and staring blankly with me at a wall of plywood varieties. How could there be so many?!

Photography: Sweet Magnolia Photography

Cake: For Heaven’s Cakes

Oreos: Love & Sugar Kisses

Invitations, Paper Goods and Party Planning: www.pinkpeppermintpaper.com

My Caroline is the princess-loving tough as nails variety of little girl. A sweet jumble of contradictions. The kind of girl you only get from having an older brother in the house. It’s hard to predict what she’ll come up with next, but when it came to her 3rd birthday celebration, she and I decided we’d combine two of her current faves–princesses and snow!

In case you missed it, here’s the invitation. We handed out the majority of them so I got a little playful with addressing them. There were Ladies, Dukes and even Barons on the invitation list.

Here’s the glitter embellishment on the envelope.

Guests were welcomed to Castle Touchet with these grapevine wreaths spray painted silver and flocked with snow.

Inside where it was warm, the royal banquet table stretched out underneath a sky of falling snow.

We had snowflake crowns for the boys and tiaras for the girls.

Princess Caroline’s birthday throne at the head of the table was all wrapped up in a bow and set off with her royal portrait.

Laid out on a blanket of snow down the center of the table were snow globes filled with a different royal and snowy scenes.

A royal crown, a snowy church, a silver slipper, and a Victorian ice skate among others.

The princess one turned out to be my favorite!

After everyone checked out our stash of toys, it was time to eat!

Our centerpiece was made up of sparkly winter branches embedded in a vase of snow.

We had simple breakfast foods like sausage balls, mini muffins, pigs in a blanket and fresh fruit on these snowflake skewers.

The crowd favorites were these donut snowmen.

And look. There’s our dainty little princess enjoying one now!

The kids also really went for these marshmallow pops.

They had juice from these sweet little cups that come with snap on lids so they don’t spill.

I decked them out in royal fashion with some ribbon and scrapbooking embellishments.

And for the adults we had hot chocolate and coffee.

The mantle was decorated with a glittery snow village and castle.

And since it was a surprisingly mild January day {naturally}, we set up a play table of snow outside.

We had a few scoops and buckets and those kiddos went to town!

Then everyone headed back inside for cake. The birthday girl was feeling unusually shy as everyone sang.

Then there was more playing in the snow before everyone said their goodbyes.

As party favors, everyone got snow powder so they could make their own snow at home.

We had a great time celebrating with the birthday girl and a sweet group of friends for her first big girl party. Happy third birthday sweet Caroline!

Sources:

Large/Small Ripple Cups, Clear Favor Boxes – Think Garnish

Invitations, Paper Crowns, Cup Wraps, Favor Tags – Pink Peppermint Paper

Cake – Dream Cakes

It’s hard to believe it’s already time again for my Christmas baby’s birthday party! Really does seem like not that long ago we hosted the silhouette-themed birthday brunch for close friends and family.  We held the celebration on her birthday (December 27th) last year because we already had everyone in town for the holidays. With all the Christmas business I do on top of the typical holiday to dos, I decided that this year we’d wait until school was back in session, hand out invitations in early January and allow ourselves some time for holiday recovery before the party on the 29th. I am brilliant, no?

Well, let me tell you, we are ALL about some princesses this year. Princesses and snow, which we never have but she enjoys talking about. A lot. Making snowmen. Snow families. Snow angels. Catching snowflakes on her tongue. Sledding. I think she’s been watching too much Olivia. We had Kristen over at Crumb Gourmet whip up these sweet No. 3 cookies for her to share with her preschool friends. We did a little touch of the licensed character stuff for her classroom celebration, which made Caroline quite happy.

And now I get to plan something inspired by the season and devoid of anything Disney, which makes me quite happy! Here is the invitation.

I tried my hand for the first time at a glitter embellishment on the invitations. It’s just a touch, but I think it really adds a big of magic to them, and sets just the right mood. I haven’t played with glitter since 1994, when a friend nominated me (in my absence I might add) to hand glitter what had to have been over 500 names on date signs for prom. Glitter has come a LONG way since then.

Note: it is unreasonably hard to capture things that are glittered in a photograph. The process confirmed something that you all already know: I am no photographer.

I went with Blackmoor, a nice regal font for our wording “Let the trumpets sounds on the joyous occasion of Princess Caroline’s Third Birthday Celebration!” I’m happy to report a good many folks have already let me know that they are coming even ten days out! Our RSVP line was “The favour of a reply we hope you’ll make. The royal baker is requesting a count for the cake!” I thought it was playful while pointing out a hostess’ very real need for people to respond if requested.

We handed out the majority of the invitations, sending some home in school bags and delivering others personally to friends in the neighborhood. I decided to have a little fun with our royal theme. Lady Isabela of the House of Caudell, Sir Wright, Duke of Wallace, Sir Shep and Lady Katherine of the House of Kirchner. Everyone had a noble title and each envelope was embellished with a glittery snowflake. Suspect people may think I’m unbalanced, but I thought it was fun (and funny) so…

I am getting super excited! Lauren and I worked yesterday on firming up some ideas. I so love having someone to brainstorm with and bounce ideas off of. Plus, she and I feed off one another. It’s almost dangerous. Can’t wait to share pictures of the big day! I’d better get busy.

What a wild and crazy year for Pink Peppermint Paper! We finished our first full year of blogging and celebrated our fourth year in the stationery business both in late October. I worked with lots of great folks who make me feel so appreciated and creative even when I don’t always see those things in myself. Somewhere in there, Lauren and I started a party planning gig–Pink Peppermint Parties. Bought a house. Sold a house, and my family and I relocated to Mississippi. Well, all except for that “sold a house” part. Ugh. No worries. 2011 is the year. I can FEEL it!

I was taking a look back at all we’ve shared with you this year. Here are some of my faves (for one reason or another) with links back to the full posts if you’re new or just missed them the first go round.

Little Girl’s Birthday Brunch – silhouette artwork and party favors inspired by my favorite little girl

High-Flying Birthday Adventure - L.O.V.E. working this super creative mom (and my former boss). Airsick bags to hold party favors. “We’re sick to see you go”!?! Yes, we did.

Hole-in-One First Birthday – The cake. The activities. THE WHEAT GRASS. Seriously.

All in Due Time Couples Baby Shower – Eight or so hostesses all living in different cities. This had no real hope of working, but it did anyway! I love it when a plan comes together.

Backyard Birthday Carnival – Fun colors. Games. Carnival food. Yum! This post gets a LOT of hits. I think it’s because of this awesome ceiling drape!

Feather Her Nest Baby Shower – Lauren hosted this for a dear friend. Love the elements from nature as well as the pops of color inspired by the baby’s nursery. RicRac, how do I love thee?

ARTy Party Lots of colors. Fun invitation. All-time favorite themed regrets line. You’re welcome.

Lifesaver Party – Our first Pink Peppermint Parties customer celebrating a big grant for a small not-for-profit, StopSMA.org. Someone wants to pay us for this?! Yea!

Hungry for more? The bugs were too at this Bug Out Birthday – the fabulous Lauren schools us on throwing an uber creative venue birthday. Where to begin…

Heroes and Villains – I’m still tired from this party in early October–my boy’s 5th.

Setting the stage for a battle of good versus evil.

Good guys and bad stand defiant atop cupcakes, capes whipping in the wind. The industrial cupcake stand was made of dampers and such from Lowe’s gutter/roofing section. Score!

Some of the good guys watching carefully from above.

I like to include elements of fun for the adults, too. C’mon now. That’s good stuff.

Neighborhood Halloween Bash – a great mix of spooky and fun at my sister’s house!

Another Fab Golf ParTee – Here’s another fun golf-themed birthday with lots of creative touches including the sought-after Sippy Cup Trophy! Man, I love a pennant banner. And argyle. Don’t get me started.

And last are these recent bottle labels. Whip a few up for NYE!

In 2010, I also saw my business double, which is due, in no small part, to those of you who follow me, leave comments and share links with friends. Many thanks! I am truly blessed to do something I love. So looking forward to new and exciting things in the coming year! Happy New Year!

Eleanor

My friend, Lesley, touched base with me several months back. She was throwing an art party for her daughter’s upcoming birthday. None of the invitations she had seen were doing anything for her so she asked me to do a custom job. I worked up several options, and here’s a sample of the invitation she chose.

The party was at a local art studio. What a fun idea! And perfect because they can get all messy and you don’t have to clean it up. Awesome.

There was painting,

and sand art.

They strung beads and enjoyed all sorts of other fabulously messy creativity. There’s the birthday girl in deep concentration over her masterpiece. (Either of mine would be sticking their tongues out just so. It’s a genetic marker on my dad’s side.)

Drumroooooolllllll please…

Magnificent! And speaking of which, what a super colorful spread! I love the use of different colored solid plates for this.

Check out this artful display of cupcakes!

Can you stand it? She used an assortment of these tilt-a-whirl baking cups. So festive!

I love these super colorful homemade crayons too. Lesley said she and her sister did this a lot as kids. My mom was pretty stinkin’ crafty, but we never did this that I recall. The only thing I was melting crayons into was the floor mat of our car.

I hope some of theoe cutie crayons were included in the party favor pails. Take a look. What else but paint buckets?

Man, oh man. Look at all that good arty loot. And how about these sweet favor tags? Paint swatches. Love it!

And finally, here are the thank you notes I did for them.

Looks like much fun was had at Ella’s 6th birthday party! What a cute party theme too. I love the idea of getting back to basic fun with art! Thanks to Lesley for letting us share in the fun.

My college roommate, Gina, and her family just celebrated her daughter’s first birthday. It seem like just yesterday that we were throwing her a baby shower. Wait. Maybe that’s because I just blogged about it a few weeks ago. Either way, I can’t believe it’s been a year! Gina had a birthday carnival on the brain. That’s the ticket! So I whipped up some custom invitation options, and here’s the one she chose.

We batted around some other sweet ideas for the party, and I think you’ll agree that Gina did not disappoint. Enjoy these photos from Ava’s First Birthday–an adorable Backyard Carnival Party!

Here’s the birthday girl doing a little pre-party horsing around with the carnival games!

Gina’s husband, Matt, built this awesome ticket booth. Dibs!

Rain, rain go away! Bad weather caused them to go to Party Plan B. They hustled to move what they could inside, but no worries! Things were lookin’ mighty festive in there!

Look at this sweet personalized birthday banner done carnival style! It framed the window near this adorable table.

Pinwheels, animal crackers, cotton candy. Yum! I love that adorable striped fabric and LOVE LOVE LOVE what they did with it on the ceiling!

I hope they left it up. So festive! And speaking of festive, how super sweet is the birthday girl in this smocked carnival-themed party dress? Perfect. (Update: For those of you who have asked, the dress is Little Threads brand purchased from bestdressedchild.com!)

Check out this popcorn machine. I would so love to have one at my house!

And of course, something to wash it down with–Colonel Smith’s Magic Elixir.

And look at this adorable cookie bouquet. How fun!

The cupcakes picked up on the colors and the polka dots from the party invitation. The design is so simple, but so joyful! Seriously. Don’t these cupcakes just epitomize a party mood?

Everyone had a BIG time despite the rain, and when the little guests left they got these happy treats! Adorable.

Here’s a closeup of the favor tags.

Once the guests had all gone home, Gina sent out thank you notes on these matching folding note cards.

What a charming first birthday carnival! Thanks G, for sharing and to Matt for playing along. Happy 1st Birthday Ava!

Our most recent soirée is proof positive that you can throw a sweet party without spending weeks on planning or execution. I pulled off the look of our daughter Caroline’s 2nd birthday in less than two hours at Hobby Lobby with both kids in tow. The dear girl’s birthday is December 27th, you see. I was later with my Christmas preparations than usual with all the holiday orders coming in and had thought up until the week prior that we would celebrate with some friends a few weeks after her actual birthday once school started back. But, we had family and friends already in town, and that coupled with my desire not to drag things out another few weeks made the decision easy. So this year, we celebrated her big day with an intimate Sunday brunch.

I started playing with digital silhouettes back in the Spring of 2008. My mother had the beautiful hand cut ones done of my sister and I when we were young, and even today when I see them, I am compelled to stand and study them for a moment. This was my inspiration for our party invitations. I love the keepsake aspect of it, and what could be more feminine and classic?  I created this sweet little girl look with a pink and brown invitation featuring a silhouette of our birthday girl. I used a scalloped paper punch to create matching return address labels with her monogram.

Pink and brown fabrics were an inexpensive and impactful way to dress up our two dining tables. I used coordinating polka dot scrapbook paper as place mats and we dusted off our fine china. Hey, we have to use it some time! Am I right? We use paper mache presents wrapped in Parisian-themed paper and grosgrain ribbon for the center of the table.

The kids ate from pink and brown nursery rhyme-themed toile and polka dot paper plates, and I used the same Parisian wrapping paper to make the party hats. I wasn’t sure about the four-year-old boys wearing pink party hats, but it turns out a party hat is a party hat, and they wanted in!

We had a fabulous spread of Cajun- and Creole-inspired dishes compliments of my fantastic husband. He not only planned the entire menu (he’s quite the foodie), but he and his wonderful mother, known as “Granny” around these parts, did literally all of the preparation and cooking. There was Shrimp Toast with Sweet Creole Tomato Sauce, Garlic Cheese Grit Souffle, Creme Broulee Lost Bread (a fantastic French toast dish), Baked Eggs with Crawfish and Mushrooms in Ham Baskets, muffins, pecan tarts and fresh fruit. The food was out of this world! I can say this because, as I said, I had no part in it. We had mimosas and coffee too because if you’re going to get yourself and your clan dressed and to our house at 9:30 on a weekend morning, then by golly, we’re going to make it worth your while!

Our cakes echoed the pink polka dot theme.

I used the paper punch again to make special candles for her big wish!

The kids played, and Caroline opened some fantastic presents while we all recovered from too much good food.

Look at her big bro so dutifully standing by to help her tear them open!

While our guests were here I took a few profile shots of them so that I could make their parting gifts. We said thanks with these folding thank you notes and what else but silhouette keepsakes?

Pink for the girls…

and red for the boys…this is one my favorite. He’s just a rock star!

What a great birthday brunch we had! Happy Birthday Sweet Caroline!