Birthday Girl

Oh darling, darling - You’re the Birthday Girl!

I can’t even believe Aliyah will be a year old one month from today. I still have days when I have to remind myself that she is not a newborn any more. I feel like we just carried her all bundled up and sleeping from the hospital yesterday - or last week... maybe last month - but almost a year ago?!?

Despite my denial over how old she really is, I have to admit that I’ve been pretty excited about planning her first birthday party for awhile. I had all the time in the world to think about it because it was so far off. Except now the calendar tells me that it is one month from today, I better have my ducks in a row because our house will be full of folks celebrating our girl’s first year of life.

Here’s What We’re Planning:

Theme: You Are My Sunshine (with a little vintage flare)

Colors: pinks, orange and yellow

Food: glass mason jars filled with pink lemon aid, pulled pork in honor of Aliyah's favorite first bites of a "real" meal, and Tyler's famous yellow lemon cake. I plan to enlist the help of a few fabulous family members to make most of the food - I will work on a few delicious sides.

The Fun Stuff: a homemade photo booth, sidewalk chalk love notes, sunshine themed music, and an exciting twist to a traditional birthday party (more about that later!)

Decorations: I'm (with huge help from my mom) making a few pretty handmade paper lanterns/tissue paper flowers, colorful party hats in her birthday colors, sunny cupcake decorations, a fun way to display photos from 1-12 months, tasty party favors for our guests to take home and possibly a vintage birthday banner (if time allows). And balloons - lots and lots of balloons!

Love this from bopeepbaby

We decided to keep our celebration intimate by only inviting family and two close friends. We have a decent size house (for the three of us, anyway) but we also have a pretty big family. So I’m crossing my fingers it is a fairly nice day and we can make use of our deck and yard too.

I am so in love with how Aliyah's invitations turned out!! They were designed by my mom and myself. Because they are handmade we were able to easily customize them with her birthday colors, theme and a photo. (I will post a picture of them later - I haven't mailed them yet, and don't want to ruin the surprise for any family members reading the blog.... BTW family - don't plan for dinner on Saturday, May 28th)

So there you go - a sneak peek at my sweet girl's sun shiny inspired happy, happy birthday celebration.

We’ve still have a lot to do before the big day arrives!