Ladybugs Everywhere!

For my princess, her first birthday was all about pinks, girlie, and ladybugs….

The planning started off with searching and searching for a theme I wanted, however, not the typical RED lady bugs.  I wanted it pink, purple, you get the picture.  I found the paper goods, but most of the decorations I had to hand create – always fun!

Let’s start with the decorations.  This is our backyard before remodel:

We had a really weird angled back yard so tables had to be set on the angle.  Pink and purple table cloths and streamers to match.  Center pieces were butterfly pots.  Hard to see in the picture, but I picked up clay pots from Michaels and painted them the colors of the party with black polka dots.  Added googly eyes and used foam sheets to make the wings and chenille sticks for the antennae.

 

On the other wall, using my beloved “Cricut“, I cut out letters and squares to make a birthday banner for the other wall of the entry way.

Again, keeping everything colorful and sticking with the ladybug theme.

For the cake, since we were planning approximately 50 guests for the first party (yes, I was crazy enough to plan two – more on that in a minute).  I decided a cake from Costco was best (very affordable).  Then I picked up a smash cake from our local bakery, Amazing Cakes in Anaheim.

Back to the fact we did 2 parties.  The first, a party for family, family friends.  The second, friends from my “Mom”s group. Since many of my “mommy friends” had two kids at this point, I figured if I invited all of them, that was at least another 50 people…therefore a division of celebrations!

And with “kiddie” parties, you need goody bags.  Those, again simple, pink bags from Party City and goodies gathered from Oriental Trading Company.