So far, Olive’s only had one party and this was it. She’s due for another coming soon, but I figured since she’s going to be three, it was about time for sharing her first birthday! This week I will be sharing parties to prepare for next week! Olive’s first birthday was needing to be something special. It was a FIRST birthday party after all. So, after scouring Pinterest for what felt like lifetimes, I settled down on the Party Animal Theme. I had seen a free printable invitation on Caravan and figured that would work. It was cute, free, and I just love Caravan so sold. I also figured there was enough Pinsperation out there to make this happen so here’s the board I created for her Party Animal 1st Birthday and here’s how it went…
PARTY ANIMALS
BIG PARTY = A PARTY AT ANOTHER LOCATION
The older I get, the more I decide to hire out, so I handed over the cake to a friend and headbands to another friend and the food to the grocery store and Jimmy Johns. Hahah. I totally cheated on all the food. But, I do still love a good DIY so there’s a few of those throughout.
I started with this horse. I apologize for bad photos, as I thought I’d play photographer and use my new skills I had just learned at a class I recently went to, but I apparently needed more practice (and still do). BUT, I found this horse on Facebook Marketplace for $25. I bought it and literally relisted it as soon as the party was over. It sported a party hat and sat on the porch and greeted the guests! I really wanted at giraffe, but couldn’t find one that didn’t break the bank.
PARTY ON
Next up was those party hats. Yes, yes, you can buy them, I know. But since I was making mini ones for all the animals all over the house, I figured it would make sense for all the hats to coordinate. I found a template online and went for it. There are mini hats in there that I already had on hand so those were put out too.
Then I made mini hats, like I said, for all the animals placed all over the house. The animals were purchased all over… groupings on marketplace, dollar tree, and a few of the nicer ones at Michaels. Animals can be found all over the place and don’t even have to be in the greatest condition. You can spray paint them to be all the same colors if they are older. I painted some small ones gold AND also a few some funky colors for a scavenger hunt I created.
This was lots of fun for the older kids who came. I made a Find these party animals Printable for you if you can make animals to match the colors. They were fun to hide around and since they weren’t super big this did take a while and occupied the kiddos while everyone was mingling!
I also made these Thank You Succulents! They were super easy! I found the cardstock labels somewhere in the stationary aisles at Hobby Lobby and then hand wrote “thank you” on them and glued them to a toothpick and topped with a mini pom. These glass jars were also picked up at Hobby Lobby. I filled the bottom with some rocks for drainage, added some potting soil and a succlent, then placed a tiny colorful animal and the toothpick thank you. They turned out really cute!
DIY DETAILS
I even let Ella paint these animals for me so they actually turned out really cute. She used different colors and they took on a tye die feel! Some almost looked swirled. This was one of those moments where perfection went out the window in lieu of satisfied children and time saving, but it worked out really well.
PARTY HATS
Almost all the party animals had tiny hats on to celebrate with us. They were made using info and templates from this post. I will say, this did take a while and getting them to stay on was another feat. After a while, I added a small drop of hot glue to the top of the animals heads to make them stay. And when the party was over, the animals moved over to the Doll House where Ella & Olive and the animals partied on…
LET THE LITTLE HAVE CAKE & EAT IT TOO
My friend Nakia made the cake for me. She now owns a business called Fork & Function here in Indy and you should definitely check them out. They host dinner parties and I’m pretty sure she makes cakes still too if you ask her nicely. It was delicious and one less thing I had to worry about. I kept it simple by just adding these few animals around it.
I did serve food, although you wouldn’t know it by these photos!
But I did, I swear. I ordered Jimmy Johns and considered that done!
Best. Decision. Ever.
We did bake party animal shaped sugar cookies – hedgehogs, squirrels, bear cubs, and more – that guests could ice and decorate with sprinkles.
That was fun for Ell as you can tell.
And these adorable animal flower headbands were made by the lovely Lindsay of Southern Sky Designs who I met though Maeve. I had reached out because I wanted flower crowns but not regular flower crowns. When she brought these in, I died when I saw the little bear cub headband.
I MEAN, HOW FREAKING CUTE
She even showed how she made them on her blog here. If you don’t already follow her, you must go now. She shares the most beautiful architecture and color combinations found all around us! I really love all of her posts!
And that’s the party in a nutshell. I also had a Hedgehog game outside that I made. It wasn’t the cutest and literally only lasted the party, but it worked. It was a beautiful day and we don’t have a lot of room, so it was nice to have a few options to hang outside. Unfortunately, I have ZERO photos.
The cake was well loved as you can see.
The party animal party was a success.
ALL the sugar was a major hit.
And I enjoyed all the DIYs throughout this one.
So now it’s time to start planning the third birthday… and I have no idea what to do…
But until then, I’ll keep thinking about all the cute little details we had at this party!
And how cute this little Party Animal still is.
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