Cecilia's Grrrr-riffic First Birthday!

My first born just turned one and I still can't believe it's been an entire year! In that time she has developed quite the personality and she lets me know what she does and doesn't like. And one thing that she definitely likes loves is Daniel Tiger! I like him a lot too and he isn't annoying like some other kids' shows... I'm looking at you, Caillou. Plus, the little songs about handling emotions and problems are already proving helpful in combating toddler craziness.

So in honor of her love for Daniel, Katarina, and the gang, we had a Daniel Tiger themed birthday party. I started off thinking I was just going to pop into my local Party City and buy some DT plates and whatnot. I was so wrong! There's basically nothing out there pre-made for Daniel Tiger which was such a bummer. So, enter Mommy and her Pinterest addiction to the rescue.

I started with a birthday invitation I whipped up on Photoshop Elements using images I downloaded from PBS. The polka dot pattern at the top and bottom are part of a scrapbooking set from Shabby Princess called Sweet Sprinkles. The color scheme was born from there.

I decided to make cupcakes for our guests since they're less mess and easy to hand out. Plus, Betty Crocker brought Rainbow Chip frosting back so that just had to happen. To decorate them, I whipped up some toppers by making and printing off images that I cut out with my Cuttlebug... yeah, I still have one of those, lol. I taped the fronts and backs together and hot glued them on lollipop sticks. Easy peasy!

For the goody bags, I made tags that said "Thank you for coming!" using the same method and tied them onto the bags with bakers twine. Since most of our kid friends are 3 and under, I gave them little mini board books and bubbles. I didn't want my tween niece and nephews to feel left out so I made them their own bags and gave them nail polish and water squirters, respectively.

I did manage to get an actual personalized Daniel Tiger banner from Zulily so that was pretty cool.

And PBS has some neat DIY tutorials and printables which is where the idea for the trolly came from. I forgot to put the yellow box on top and I didn't realize it until we were already setting up at the park. Oh well... no one knew but me, lol.

And, of course, I had to do the first birthday chalkboard. I already had the board and I bought the chalk markers at Wal-Mart.

For our party supplies, I hit up Hobby Lobby, Dollar Tree, and Five Below where I stocked up on green, pink, and orange plates, napkins, cutlery, table cloths, bowls, etc.

Then, there was the awesome smash cake. I thought about buying a bakery made cake but they're ridiculously expensive and it was going to be destroyed anyway so I opted to make it myself. I used Cecilia's Daniel Tiger figurines and just used some green frosting to make grass on a plain white cake with vanilla frosting. For some color, I added a few flower shaped sprinkles where I meticulously picked out the pink, orange, and white ones. The Happy Birthday banner was made in Photoshop and I just printed it off and tied it to straws.

And last but not least... my favorite thing I made. Her birthday outfit! I'm so mad at myself for not getting good pictures of her in it but I was so busy being hostess, I didn't even think to get my camera out. (Shout out to my sis-in-law for getting most of the pictures in this post!) I used the colors from Shabby Princess's scrapbook set and made a fun bubble pattern. Then I ordered custom fabrics from Spoonflower. The dress and the bloomers are made from patterns from Mama Can Do It and I just love them! I also made matching necklaces for the two of us and a little pennant banner for her high chair using the leftover scraps. During the cake smash, I took her dress off and we put a t-shirt on her with an iron-on from Hobby Lobby that read "I am 1" and it just happened to be pink and orange! On a side note, I'm planning on doing a little photo shoot of her in her dress this weekend as long as her cold clears up... the poor kid is a snotty little mess right now.

I planned on doing a simple cookout for the food and when my dad got word, he volunteered to do all of the cooking. He did an awesome job and there was a ton of food! Burgers, hot dogs, chips and dips, potato salad, beans, fruit and veggies, chili, slaw, all the fixins! It was delicious and no one left hungry! (Dad is the big guy in the blue shirt... that's my bro-in-law that he's talking to.)

So, there you go... Cecilia's first birthday! I couldn't have pulled it all off without my family and friends. They were adamant in helping with everything at the party and reminding me of how pregnant I am, lol. They're pretty awesome. Looking back on getting everything ready beforehand, it does seem like a ton of work but I really enjoy making things and if I wasn't working on this stuff, I'd be making something else during nap times anyway.

Until next time! Ugga mugga!
Kim

Pattern Storage Perfection

I don't know about you guys but I absolutely love printable patterns! They make sewing projects so simple especially when there are detailed tutorials included. I'd much rather spend $5 or $6 on an etsy designer's work than picking up a discounted Simplicity or McCall's pattern for $1.99. Not to mention, a number of amazing bloggers offer up their patterns for free. (I also think that this is a great way for beginners to experiment a little bit before investing in more complicated patterns.)

That being said, I have downloaded A LOT of patterns and I print them on card stock so I can use them over and over again. Sounds great in theory but then I realized I had an organization problem the other day while I was trying to determine which bodice went with which dress bottom. It was a mess! I eventually figured it out but I spent a good 30 minutes getting all my patterns in order. Then I had an idea... I decided to make a binder for all my printed patterns including the info on where they came from so I can always get back to the tutorials if I need to. Genius! Why hadn't I thought of this before instead of just piling them in my desk all willy-nilly?!

So, I picked up a pretty new binder and matching subject dividers on one of my many trips to Target. (Does anyone else still get really excited about about back to school gear even though they've graduated many years ago?) I almost bought the plain cheap'o stuff but then remembered I'm a grown up and I'll probably have this binder for YEARS sitting on my shelf in my little sewing corner... might as well get something that's pleasing to the eyes!

Ooooh, pretty flowers!

I already had a ton of page protectors from Staples at home that I used to tuck each of my patterns into. Then, using Photoscape, I made little cover pages to slide down into the bottom of each sleeve so I'll know exactly what's in each one. I included a picture of a finished project, where it came from, and wrote what size the pattern is cut to since I have multiple sizes in some things. You could do full pages but I opted to cut them into thirds to save on paper.

A Cecilia + Jo original... it was drawn instead of printed but you get the idea.

Once I got that completed, I slipped everything in the binder and I realized I had yet another problem. The page protectors were just as wide as the dividers so I couldn't see the tabs. Grrr! That irked me soooo bad!

Which led me to a little mini project involving card stock, double sided tape, a hole puncher, and my paper cutter. Yes, I really am that obsessive about things! The above picture of the inside of the binder was after I fixed it but here's what I did to make it work. 

Tools of the trade.

To make my tabs fit, I just cut regular 8.5x11 card stock in half long ways, folded it, and slid the dividers inside just enough to cover the existing holes and held them together with the double sided tape. Then, I trimmed the edge to get the desired width and punched holes using another divider as a guide. And last but not least, I put my label maker to work to whip up some adorable little category tags... they have flowers. :)

I think it came out perfectly and it only took about 15 minutes total. Now all my patterns are at my finger tips and ready to be used on a whim!

Until next time,

Kim