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Surprise Birthday Party

A couple of weeks ago, along with some friends, I was involved in throwing a surprise birthday party for a friend. It was awesome because she never suspected and we all had a blast surprising her :) My part in the party was the decor and I have some photos to share with you all.

I chose black and white with touches of gold for the theme. Originally, I was going to do black and white stripes but I had a hard time finding enough striped things (who knew?!) and so I threw in polka dots as well. I loved the simplicity of the color scheme mixed with the patterns. Super fun!

I made a striped runner from fabric I found at Ikea. I have been wanting a chance to make a runner like this and it was the perfect opportunity! I found the small gold frames at the Dollar Tree and labeled all of the foods on the table. This shot was taken before all the food was laid out but you get the idea.

I ran a length of gold ribbon down the center and added some gold confetti that I punched out from gold paper in two different sizes.

For the cups, I bought plain white paper cups and drew on them with either a black sharpie or a gold paint pen using all different patterns. I made 80 different cups and it was rather fun :) The polka dot napkins are from Hobby Lobby and I used gold plates also from Hobby Lobby.

The party was at a friend’s house and they have a super long table which was perfect for the food. For the candle jars, I bought them at the Dollar tree and sprainted the gold stripes/polka dots onto them.

I made a bunch of paper flowers and hung them in the chandelier. This was my favorite part of the whole party decor!! I used kraft mailing paper for the petals, black tissue paper for the center along with some moss. Then I gave them a light dusting of gold spraint for a bit of sparkle which you could see IRL but it’s hard to tell in the photos. I followed this tutorial to make them and they were super easy.

More flowers :) I free handed the letters for the banner, cut them out and strung them with baker’s twine.

I made a bunch of flags to wave for when she arrived. They all said different things like party, hooray, celebrate… you get the idea :) I made them out of fabric attached to a skewer and drew on them with a gold paint pen. Can you tell that I love gold paint pens?!

I also made a bunch of blank cards and people wrote on them for the birthday girl. I used glitter paper and made it into tape to secure the card to a piece of cardstock.

For the favors, I bought polka dot tissue paper and cut squares then folded them to make an envelope. Then, I put a cookie in them (I put them in a plastic bag first) and sealed them with a glitter heart.

And last but not least… the cake! I did not make the cake, a very talented friend did. But isn’t it gorgeous? The gold layers sparkled and the effect was perfect. The paper flowers were made by The Paper Pimpernel.

So there you have it, a black, white, and gold birthday party. I love how the decor turned out but even better was that it blessed our friend and that we pulled off the surprise. It was a success :)

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Tagged: Parties

Dream Big Journals & Invitations

Yesterday, I showed you the party decor from our slumber retreat at church. Today, I thought I would show you a few more details. As I mentioned, I made little journals for each attendee. They turned out so cute I just had to share them with you :) I also made invitations and figured I would show them off too. First up, the invites.

I like to call them invitations but really they are flyers. They had to include all of the information that the ladies would need. When I sat down to make them, I realized a simple invitation layout wouldn’t work, there was too much info. So I revised it a bit and made a different layout than a traditional invitation. Again, I took a bunch of inspiration from stuff I’ve pinned on Pinterest. After they were completed, I put them in a mini brown paper sack. They are so cute it kills me :)

I found the dream big stamp at Michaels. For the backside of the invitation, I added a fun patterned paper that was left over from the journals I made. Each one was different which made it even more fun!

The invitation/flyer. I really love how it turned out. The only thing I was bummed about was the title at the top could have been bigger. When you are working on a large computer screen it looks big and then you print it and it’s way smaller than you think. I normally do a print test but by the time I got to this point it was already midnight and I had to have them done by church the next morning. I always seem to work late at night. I really should get an earlier start next time :)

And for those of you who watch out for me (thank you by the way!), the address and phone number at the bottom is the church information which is already public online so I figured it didn’t matter if I posted it here.

Now, moving onto the little journals.

I started off with some thick pink-red chipboard for the cover. Each cover was different. Again, I used the dream big stamp from Michaels but this time I embossed it.

The first page had a spot for the date and a title if you wanted to add one. Each journal was different and that was part of the fun. It made it really fun for me to make them and I sort of got attached to them and wanted to keep them all :)

I put a handmade pocket in each of them. Fun, fun.

I also added a list paper of some sort. Again, each one was different.

I made tiny envelopes for each of them too. Most of them were made out of graph paper but there was a variety. I also added a little tab to one of the pages.

I bought all of the papers from Michaels. They are a variety of companies but I know I used some Cosmo Cricket and K & Co. I can’t remember the rest :)

More fun graph paper. I really love graph paper!

The stickers I added came from my own collection and I have had some of them for forever so I don’t remember where most of them came from. I do know that the one above is from K & Co.

There are 8 pages for each journal. The Top Secret is from Knock, Knock.

And lastly, the back cover. After I sorted all of the pages, I punched and spiral bound them using my Zutter Bind-it-all. I think spiral binding is so much easier to use than rings.

Whenever I throw a party I always make extra stuff just in case there are last minute people who want to come. That means, that I have several of these cute little journals left so I thought I would sell them in my Etsy shop. There are actually two sizes, you can see them here and here if you are interested. They are selling for $6 each.

And that brings my party planning to an end. At least for this event :) I already have an idea for the next one.  But first, I think I need a breather :)

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Tagged: Parties, Scrapbooking

Slumber Retreat

Last week I mentioned that I hosted a women’s retreat at the church the week prior. Well, I’m back today to reveal photos from it! The event went very well and we all had a great time. We wanted to do a retreat and decided to just hold it at the church so that we could keep the cost low for those attending. That meant that we all spent the night at the church! I called it a slumber retreat (slumber party + retreat). Two weeks ago, we all packed in our air mattresses, sleeping bags, and flashlights and headed to the church for an overnight stay.

Since it was a slumber party for women, I wanted the theme to be bright, colorful, and fun. The decor ideas all started with some plates and napkins that I saw at Target and it just went crazy from there. The following photos are from the main room where we ate and had our sessions.

It is really hard to get good photos in this room because there are no windows… so I just did my best :) We kept the tables set up the whole time for meals and teaching sessions.

See all of the confetti? I punched out four different sizes of circles with my punches in a bunch of different colors of cardstock. I punched so many circles that I actually developed 3 blisters! But they were worth it because it’s my favorite part of the table decor. And what is funny about it was it was totally an afterthought. I was ready to go to bed the night before and around 11:00 PM I had the idea for the confetti so I punched them all out. Sometimes last minute ideas are the best!

I am completely in love with the plates, napkins, and table cloths; all from Target. The neon plastic silverware are from the Dollar Tree but I don’t recommend them. They broke very easily. We had silverware pieces flying everywhere! But they look cute :) I guess that is the main point for me. Ha ha!

Each woman received a gift bag filled with things necessary for a sleep over like nail polish, a glow bracelet, journal, pens, ear plugs, and candy. They were really fun to assemble. I made the little journals for each one and I will have to post photos of those later because they turned out really cute.

The theme of the retreat was Dream Big. We explored what God’s dreams for us are. I created the dream wall using Frog Tape. The wall was supposed to say dream in large letters made from post it notes but we couldn’t get the post its to stick to the wall. Then we remembered that we had some frog tape in the storage room and we whipped it out. I actually like how this turned out better. Failed projects are always a failure :)

The idea behind the dream wall was for people to post God’s dreams for them on it with post it notes. We ended up having to tape them to the wall but it was really neat and I got to save all of the post its. I’m going to put them in a journal later.

Even the music stands got a little decor :)

You know how it is when you are at a party and you can’t remember which drink is yours? I put these stickers on the cups so we could write our name on them with no confusion :)

The food table. We had dinner, then dessert and snacks, and then breakfast the next morning laid out on this food table. I made the fringe garland from plastic table cloths purchased from Target using this tutorial. They were really easy and I love the way they turned out. For the garlands on the wall I used this tutorial. The tutorial calls for crepe paper but I had so much of the plastic table cloths left over that I used that instead which is why mine look a little different and aren’t so stiff. I still love how they turned out, and again, they were really easy and hardly took any time. I really wanted to keep them up for forever :)

I (along with some helpers) also made streamers for the tables. They are super cute and look ruffly. I used this tutorial for them. Man, I love Pinterest. It’s where most of these ideas came from. How would I plan a party without it?!

Obviously, this is a photo before there was any food on the table, but I labeled each item. I like to do this for people with allergies so they know what they are eating. Plus, it looks cute :) I used the neon post it notes to label everything. I found all of the cute bins from the dollar store and put the food in them. It made the table really colorful and plus, I can reuse them.

I’m thankful to the Lord for our little Dream Big Slumber Retreat and I’m glad it went so well. I’m already starting to think about the next one :) Don’t you just love parties?!

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Tagged: Parties

Ladies’ Dinner Part Two

Ready for part two of the Ladies’ dinner?! If you want to read the first half, click here.

I love decorating for parties. It’s so fun to have a concept and see it come to completion. This little party turned out just right, everything I had hoped. Good company, good fellowship, good food. So here are a few more photos to show the rest of the event:

Yummy, yummy food. I really love to see it all laid out like that.

Isn’t the flower arrangement gorgeous? I brought a bunch of flowers to my Mom and begged asked her to arrange them for me. She is so much better at it than I am and so I knew I was in good hands. She did such a great job. And now we have the arrangement sitting in front of the lectern for the rest of the fall season so we can keep enjoying it.

A little bit closer… It’s beautiful, thanks Mom! And now, onto the food:

My favorite part about food is dessert so we will start there. For each food item I had a little card that said what it was and a list of the ingredients. We have a few people that have allergies so it is nice for them to be able to identify what is in everything. The recipe for these peanut butter brownies came from here and they are tasty!

I made 3 desserts and my favorite was these pumpkin cupcakes. I’m not usually a pumpkin-in-dessert fan but these were amazing! I think it may have had something to do with the cinnamon cream cheese frosting! The recipe can be found here. I just made them mini size instead of regular cupcake size. That way, we could all have a taste of each of the 3 desserts :)

The mini apple pies were also tasty. I used a recipe from The Mennonite Cookbook so I don’t have a link for it but if you ever want to make yummy food from scratch, that is a wonderful cookbook. I have never made anything from it that I didn’t like.

We also had a few appetizers. Three was once again the magic number. There were fruit kabobs, caprese on a stick, and a brie cheese appetizer.

The brie cheese appetizer was really good and super easy. I bought toasted wheat thins and spread brie cheese on them. Then I sprinkled them with crushed pistachios and set them on a bed of baby spinach. The flavors were really good together.

Since we don’t have kitchen facilities at our church, anything hot has to be in a crock pot if we want to keep it that way. So, an easy thing to bring is soup. Once again I chose three soups, white chicken chili, broccoli cheddar, and harvest soup. I don’t have the recipes for these online but they were all wonderful and I wouldn’t mind making them each again soon!

I bought little chalkboards at Michaels and wrote the name of each soup. I think they look really cute and I can use them again in the future!

I also scattered some more plants in books on the food table along with some other stuff that came from my house or my Mom’s house.

Most of the stuff above is my Mom’s. I love the wooden saltine cracker box.

And that about wraps it up! Aren’t parties the best?

Like I said previously, I am leaving for a little vacation so I’m not sure how often I will be posting in the next week. I have some things lined up so hopefully I will remember to get them posted :)

I hope you all have an excellent weekend!!

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Tagged: DIY, Parties

Ladies’ Dinner Part One

As I mentioned yesterday, I spent all of last week preparing for an event that we had at church. We were having a Ladies’ Dinner on Sunday night and I wanted to make it really special. We had such a wonderful time and everything went really well, it was a blessing. Today, I thought I would share some of the decor that I made for the event. There are quite a few photos so I’m going to break this up into two posts.

I was so busy running around on Sunday that I was working right up to the wire. The last thing on my to do list was take photos and so most of these photos were very hurried. I was hoping to have time to spend on taking good pictures but these will have to do :) At least I got some right? Plus the lights can get very bright in there but I had to have them on because there are no windows. Because of that, some of the photos have major glare. Oh well, you get the idea! First up: the tables:

We rented round tables because I like them so much better than the long rectangular tables we normally use. And of course, we also rented the tables cloths. I had in mind rustic fall when I was planning this so I guess you can call that my theme. I don’t know why but I hate themes. I guess even though I don’t like to call it a theme, that’s what it is anyway :)

Each table had couple stacks of books and then a plant in a book. I also used lanterns from Target (but forgot candles!) on the stack. For the plants I found succulents that would work and had my Dad drill holes into the books (book lovers don’t hate!) to set the plants in. It was sort of funny because I just went to the thrift store and started pulling out hardbound books that were only a $1 to use for this project. My main object was to look for books that were thick if possible and in colors that worked for my theme.

My Dad told me later that he had a problem with the book in the photo above. Apparently there was quite a bit of swearing and he had trouble finding a page without it. Especially funny because it was a large print edition so I’m sure those particular words would have jumped right off the page. I guess next time I should read the books before choosing them for an event like this :)

After the books were drilled, I put the succulent right into the book and put moss around the dirt. I think they turned out pretty cool.

For each place setting, I layered a gold plate, then a brown plate, then a leaf doily in red. Next I added a paper napkin surrounding gold plastic silverware tied together with twine. For the top I added a vintage Bible trivia game card that I thought was kind of fun.

Each lady also had a menu next to her place setting. I hand wrote the titles and then scanned them into my computer and added the rest of the text then printed them out. I loved how they looked like I hand drew each one. I really love calligraphy. I just wish I was better at it :) I even took a class once but I just don’t have the patience (or desire I guess) to practice enough to be really good. So I just settle for okay :)

As a little gift, each person got a journal that I found at Michael’s, with a pencil. There were several styles of journals, I loved them all! There were also several styles of pencils in different plaids and colors. They felt very fall to me. Then I added the wrap to the journals and the flag to the pencils.

And that is where I am going to wrap up today. Stay tuned for next time, I have more to share!!

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Tagged: DIY, Parties