Vintage Picnic Baby Shower Part II

I wanted to share a couple more details from the baby shower last weekend. Starting with...

The He Says, She Says game I adapted from the one Jen made for Kristen's bridal shower I was so impressed with. Jen was kind enough to send me the file which made customizing it for the baby shower a breeze. 

I asked both Joey and Lulu the same 14 questions. Then I included either one of their answers to each question on the game sheet next to a pair of girl and boy silhouettes. Guests had to answer who they thought said each statement. Everyone loved hearing about the baby and the new parents' childhoods. 

 

I also wanted to show you a closer look at one of the other vintage greeting cards I framed for the party's decor. Since the cards were smaller than the frames I wanted to use, I just added a doily to the sides, which even added to the vintage effect.

And while we're on the topic of J + L's baby shower, I can't resist sharing another invitation my brother helped create for the modern pink tutu themed shower Lulu's side of the family hosted the weekend before. It is the sweetest thing ever!

They hand-cut the "body" for each invitation after printing the text onto a lovely iridescent card stock. Then they superglued the string of scrapbooking pearls around the neck and hand-sewn "tutu" to the bottom.

My brother has some serious crafting potential! It must run in the family... ;)

Sadly I had a previous engagement and wasn't able to attend the party, but I know they had a blast without me.

Vintage Picnic Baby Shower Part I

We celebrated the upcoming birth of my first niece yesterday and I was thrilled to help host the shower along with my mom (and lots of help from the aunts and my sister).

I basically spent the whole day Friday baking cookies to use for the favors. I've never made so many cookies at one time in my life. I used the sugar cookie recipe from Mrs. Fields -- it's no fail.

Then I decorated each one by hand. And it took a ridiculous amount of time.

Once they dried, they were placed in these cute little bags my mom found at a local knick-knack shop.

In addition to the cookies, guests could also take home a cake pop as a favor. I found a bunch of cute vintage greeting card designs that I framed and placed throughout.

I absolutely loved the cupcakes and so did my brother and sister-in-law.

They actually found and sent me the image to use, which made my job super easy. All I did was print sheets of the adorable little vintage baby (with bunny slippers and ruffled bootie) onto white linen card stock. Then I punched out the image using a 1 11/16" hole punch and the scalloped hole punch in pink linen card stock. The cupcakes themselves are red velvet (from a box, I'm not superwoman or anything) with cream cheese frosting. We topped them with the same pink pearl sprinkles we used for the cookies and wrapped them with the edges of... paper doilies using this tutorial. (I love when I actually carry out the tutorials I pin!)


Some of the clothes strung on the clothesline were actually worn by the mom-to-be as a baby.

More details coming later once I track down another photographer's photos as I was so busy putting together the shower's finishing touches that my photo coverage is seriously lacking.

Stripey Straw Banner Tutorial

Here's a quick little 10 minute project I accomplished today while waiting for Ava to wake up before running an errand to our new favorite place, the Restoration Hardware outlet. More surprises to come along the same lines as this, but first you have to endure a pictorial tutorial... (All you need are washi tape and scissors, and the straws of course.)

 

 

 

 

I've been wanting to make these for ages, so I'm happy I finally sat down and did it. I bought these gray stripey straws for Ava's birthday party, purposely choosing a neutral color so I could use them for some other parties lately too. And the fuchsia floral washi tape adds the perfect feminine touch for the vintage backyard picnic baby shower in my parents' amazing garden.

Breakfast at Tiffany's Bridal Shower

Yesterday I had breakfast at Tiffany's... or at her uncle Joe's amazing garden anyway. Tiffany's long-anticipated bridal shower was so much fun we're already talking about a shower reunion party. It was so exciting to see all the planning come to fruition.

Here are just a few of the pretty party details:

Framed pics with quotes and pics of Audrey lined the expansive outdoor kitchen bar.

The dessert bar included (right to left) aqua and pearl gumballs, rock candy sticks, Hershey's kisses, and some yummy cupcakes made by Katherine of Irish Italian Blessings.

We had bagels with cream cheese, croissants, blueberry and melon fruit salad, and Sarah's delicious egg and sausage casserole.

Of course no breakfast party is complete without mimosas.

The beautiful bride poses in the background as the MOH Megan leads the bridesmaids in a toast of Dom P. c. 1996.

Tiffany's mom created the gorgeous centerpieces with glass pebbles, green moss, and pink roses.

Tissue paper pompoms are a really easy way to tie in a party's color scheme and make it feel more festive.

I couldn't get over how insanely beautiful this yard was. 

Double-stuffed Oreo cookie favors also created by Katherine (a seriously talented DIY mom and an incredible person).

Gifts to match the theme.

This garden was so inspiring as we're starting to dive into our own landscaping.

 

 

 

Vintage Backyard Picnic Baby Shower Invitations

My mom and I are hosting a family-style baby shower for my brother and his wife (also Ava's godparents) who are expecting their first -- a little girl who will undoubtedly become Ava's favorite playmate. I have lots more to say about my brother's sweet little family and my sis-in-law's adorable baby/mama style. But without further ado, I am excited to share my latest project in anticipation of their vintage backyard picnic shower... 

 

I wasn't given much notice to design these invitations (seems to be a trend lately) but was really happy with the finished product. My sweet little brother had started working on them himself (he didn't want to bother me as I was deep in the interview process for a new position I just accepted today!) and Lulu had a specific design in mind, so he provided the image of the vintage buggy. They're printed on 65 lb. Kraft paper and wrapped with a doily and pink ribbon to give it a feminine touch.

Festival de Cannes Dinner Party Menu

Alex did an amazing job with the delicious and authentic Provençal meal he prepared for my birthday dinner.

Sautéing the vegetables and garlic for the soupe au Pistou.

We did not have a cheesecloth to prevent the bouquet garni used to flavor the soup from mixing with the more edible parts, so we used a strainer and it actually worked out pretty well.

The Pistou was my absolute favorite. It's meant to garnish the soup but we also used it as a salad dressing; although I could (and did) eat it by the spoonful.

Rosemary lemon chicken getting ready to be baked in the oven. The best chicken I've ever tasted. Ever.

Also on the menu was a California take on the Niçoise salade with fresh, sushi-grade ahi tuna that looked something like this (minus the festive serving dish)...

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Bon appetit!

Festival de Cannes Dinner Party Decor

Although the work we've been doing on the house came to a close before the party as promised (well, that morning, so it counts), we weren't quite sure the yard and pool would be in party condition, so we decided to make it a dinner party instead. And honestly, it was so hot I think everyone appreciated the escape from the sun in the comfort of our nicely air conditioned dining room.


Alex turned out to be an amazing party planner, and seeing him working so hard to throw me a perfect birthday party was the sweetest thing ever. 


But of course I had to add a few of my own little touches to the decor...

I put together little door prizes to make it official.

I printed photos of some of the iconic Cannes Film Festival looks throughout the ages (found here) and strung them across the foyer.

One of my new favorite party decor ideas... I printed postcards of Cannes and the film festival. This one is my favorite.

I realized I am not fully equipped to set a table for 12, so that's something I'll need to work on if I plan to host more formal dinner parties of this size (which obviously I do!), or even Thanksgiving dinner with my immediate family for that matter. 

The beautiful bouquet of roses a good friend had delivered to me on my actual birthday (such a fun surprise since I don't remember the last time I had flowers delivered!) were the perfect addition to the table. The palm tree candlesticks were on clearance at Target. I recently found the Italian garden napkins on eBay. See the rest of my table setting here.

My awesome friends came bearing gifts of peonies and French macarons from La Boulange. They know me too well.

Thirty is treating me very well so far. There's quite a lot going on around here so more updates to follow...

Festival de Cannes

A certain someone (hint: it's me!) has a certain milestone birthday approaching (hint: I'm turning 30) so my amazing, wonderful, loving husband is planning a Cannes Film Festival pool party to celebrate.

(I had nothing to do with the theme selection, honest.)

Why thank you, Marilyn. Happy birthday to you too.

I think Alex has a little inner party planner too because he's already been talking about some of the fun surprises he has planned... Oh, okay, fine, think heated pool with glowing beach balls (see below; source unknown), strung white Christmas lights throughout, and... outdoor movie projector!



I feel like a kid getting so excited about my birthday party.

But until then, I'll be dreaming of the French Riviera...

Breakfast at Tiffany's Bridal Shower Invitations

Project of the week: Invitations to Breakfast at Tiffany's Bridal Shower

I think I came pretty close to the one we envisioned here.

Ribbon and rhinestones would have been nice, but I whipped these out in one evening with very little notice.

The card stock is Bazzill Basics grasscloth in Navajo and it's very close to the authentic Tiffany blue color (though it's hard to tell in the pictures above). I bought 12" x 12" sheets from Michael's and cut them down to 5" x 7" (3-up) at Kinko's before printing.

I found the Audrey silhouette in Google images and plan to use it in the party decor as well.

Everything else is right on track and the bridal shower planning crew is ready for action in -- drumroll please -- 29 days!

Happily Ever After

Kristen's bridal shower was on Sunday. You may remember reading about the party planning a while back so I'm excited to share the details of how it all actually came together...

Packing everything up to take to the shower venue.

I framed some quotes I found online (mostly from Pinterest) that fit the fairy tale / love story theme and we set them out around the private room we rented at Picán restaurant in downtown Oakland.

My personal favorite:

"Once in a while, in the middle of an ordinary life, love gives us a fairy tale."

I also found the perfect scrapbook I filled with adorable pictures of K and B together to use as a guestbook. (It's in the bottom-right corner in the photo above.) I'm going to add in pictures from the shower for Kristen to keep as a memento.

I was also pretty happy with how the banner turned out. I just printed "Bride to Be" on the same white card stock as the invitations and taped it to the pink card stock backing to leave a thin border, then hole-punched the top corners and strung the twine through. The restaurant had the perfect wine rack where we could hang it along with some hot pink tissue paper pompoms via Martha at either end. 

Here I am with the beautiful bride-to-be and lovely MOH Jennifer. 

We set some gray stripey straws at the bar next to a cute little succulent, as well as in the water glasses at each place setting.

The bride and her future SIL enjoying a delicious lavender lemon drop martini that conveniently matched the party's color scheme.

For the centerpieces, we set potted flowers (left and right photos below are baby roses and center is a hydrangea) atop classic fairy tales, love stories, and romantic collections of poems tied with raffia.

We also broke out the old Scrabble game and spelled out as many wedding-related words/phrases as we had letters for. Then we scattered glass pebbles and Hershey's kisses for the finishing touch.

I can't take credit for the menu cards and games. Jennifer did an amazing job with those and were a huge hit. We set them at each place setting while we were setting up so we didn't have to spend quality time passing things around during the party. 

We also put these little note cards in the same colors from Target at each place setting so guests could write their words of wisdom for marital bliss or just general well wishes to Kristen that we'll include in the guest book along with pictures of the guests.

Then we filled glittery silver favor boxes from Pier 1 with chocolates for guests to take home.

Kristen was the most adorable little girl and everyone loved admiring her childhood photos and guessing her age.

The keys are actually bottle openers from Bed, Bath & Beyond. Jen also found the adorable bags for the prizes. And she actually made those flower pens for my own bridal shower a few years ago. (I've used them for a few parties since then -- I love them!)

The ladies all insisted Kristen showcase her place setting as she opened gifts containing the various pieces.

Kristen was not very impressed with the ribbon bouquet I crafted. (And she'll probably kill me for including this picture.)

Kristen, I love you and can't wait to see you marry your prince charming and live happily ever after! 
There's no one more deserving of a fairy tale ending than you.