Needless to say, being a sibling myself, I knew if I did something cool for one baby I would HAVE to do something cool for the other. The last thing I want is one feeling left out 5 or 10 years down the road.. ha ha... I had no intention of waiting a full 7 months this time. So, I decided a separate Gender Reveal Party would be fun. Instead of using the typical baby pink or blue I wanted to go for something more modern and fun. So, my red and turquoise "B or G...what will it be?" party was born. I started by designing this fun invitation.
Then, I decided rather than having the party at a house I wanted to have it at one of my favorite restaurants. Almost no time setting up, and the best part....NO DISHES!!! I showed up to the restaurant about 30 minutes prior to the party. They gave me a private back room. All I did was tie red and turquoise balloons to each chair in alternating colors. I made matching place cards for the guests, and the kids had puzzles with crayons to keep them busy during dinner. I had my doctor write on a piece of paper the gender and seal it in an envelope for me(so even I didn't know the sex). I took that envelope to my favorite bakery, Trio Cafe, and had them make up 2 dozen mini cupcakes for me. The filling would be blue or red. This way, when we bit into our cupcakes we all found out together. Some had red sprinkles on top and some had blue. I also made coordinating cupcake toppers for each.
To add a little fun and interaction, everyone had one of these little booklets I made folded into their napkins. It asked what gender they thought baby Hutchison was going to be, and what names they would pick out and a couple of funny facts. They ended up being quite humorous to read. I have them all, and are putting them in the baby book for Marshall to see when he gets older. 
After a fun dinner we passed out the cupcakes. Altogether on the count of three everyone opened up their cupcakes... 
It was a great party, and a fun way to include family and friends...Linked To:
Next, came Meela's Rainbow 1st birthday. Isn't she the most adorable thing ever?? This invite of course inspired a great rainbow party internet search...I will blog those ideas at a later date.
And last, comes one of my favorites!! This is what I am calling "Operation Baby". My brother and his beautiful wife are expecting a baby in 3 months. He is a devoted military man, and they live far far away from her family. With his hectic military schedule, a shower is not possible to plan. So, I am sending out an announcement to friends and family letting them know where they can go to find gifts and necessities for the baby. We are going to send them directly to their home. It may not be a conventional shower, but baby JD will know he is loved!!
My daughter is absolutely obsessed with Winnie the Pooh, so of course that had to be the theme of her 2nd birthday party. We had the party at her Grandparents house in North Richland Hills, TX( suburb of Fort Worth). I went all out to create her very own 100 Aker Wood. All of the gorgeous photos were taken by our wonderful photographers at 
I designed the invitations myself, using one of the cutest pictures from her 18 month photo shoot. Using a pattern that I bought on ETSY, I made her little tunic top. Which, of course, had all the characters from Winnie the Pooh, and the yellow fabric had little honey bees on it. My friend Tracy made the matching bows! 
Luckily for me, my in-laws have a completely empty dining room. This was much to my advantage! I used butcher paper purchased from a local teacher supply store to make the trees. My friend Tracy came over and helped me put it all together. These were so easy to do. We just crumpled the brown paper a little and stapled it up the wall to look like tree trunks. Then, we cut out leaves from the green paper and stapled them to the wall and ceiling. I hung a large yellow paper lantern(leftover from her Garden themed 1st Birthday) from the light fixture and used orange and yellow curling ribbon to hang down around it. That was our "sun". We hung blue streamers across the ceiling of the room as our sky, and tied 4-5 white balloons together in bunches and hung them around as the "clouds". I found a big package of cut out bees from the teachers supply store, and hung those all around the room and near the trees. Tracy hand painted the "floating Pooh Bear" on foam poster board for me, and we hung him at the entrance from his little blue balloon. It looked just like Pooh did in the movie, trying to reach his hand into the bee hive for honey! I used red and white gingham fabric as the buffet table cloth, and yellow and white gingham fabric to cover the guest tables.(all bought at Wal-Mart for a few dollars a yard, very cheap) 
For the buffet centerpiece I bought cheap cardboard letters that spelled Catie at Hobby Lobby and painted them with leftover paints. I hot glued them to wooden dowels and then hot glued the dowels to an old glass shelf that I found in my garage. To give it more height I set the glass shelf up onto 2 glass vases filled with colorful shredded paper. 
I scoured Ebay for the whole set of stuffed animals, and luckily found one of each character. Even better, I found the Birthday Pooh!! I used them on the buffet as my "food labels". I printed out the name of each food on cardstock and cut it out to look like little pieces of wood. Each character held their sign. I had "Tigger Tail Mix" which was Cheddar Chex party mix and cheese puffs. "Piglets in Blankets" pretty explanatory, and "Rabbits Veggie Garden". I made "Pooh Sticks", which were just pretzel sticks dipped in chocolate. Plus, there were fruit skewers, sandwiches and a chicken nugget tray. For the kids, I took the frozen Uncrustable PBJ sandwiches and wrapped them with a strip of really pretty scrapbook paper. 
At the drink station there were bottled waters with custom labels(which I designed and printed myself to match the invitations), a kid friendly punch called "Pooh Beary Splash" and an adult friendly cocktail called "Kanga's Kooler". Even the adults need a little something...ha ha Outside we had beer for the guys in a cooler.
I bought these amazing vanilla cupcakes from a local bakery called 
I bought small flower pots at my local Dollar Tree and painted them to look like honey pots.(previous post 
Catie had lots of family and friends come to help her celebrate her 2nd birthday. She is definitely a blessed little girl. Here are some great pictures of her guests.
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I have also gotten a new camera in the last few months. So, of course I have been playing around with that a lot! We went with the Nikon D3000. I am just getting used to it, but I think I am going to love it. 
I have been messing around with an old dress pattern that I have, trying to find new ways to "spruce" it up for Catie. This is the Fall themed dress I came up with for her. I added the bib front and ruffle along the bottom. A BIG thanks to her Nana for crocheting the awesome flower 
Last but definitely not least, the NEW MAN in my life.... Yes, I said man, as in male gender!! Our little surprise has turned out to be a boy. 
Below are some inspirational party pics from 
Very pretty colors of pink, coral and light blue make it super girly and frilly. I am really into the cherry blossoms right now, so I wanted to incorporate some into the invitation. This way she can use them to decorate with along with the Lambs. 
Clockwise: Cherry Blossom Cupcakes(
