Landon's Winter ONEderland

Get ready for a super long blog post...this time I get to post about my baby's party!! I have wanted to plan a first birthday party for such a long time and boy oh boy I sure had fun finally getting to do it! We were blessed with so many special friends, and family, that came to help us celebrate. Dave's parents drove all the way from New York just for the weekend. L is a pretty loved little boy.

Welcome to Landon's Winter ONEderland......

I am NOT a graphic designer by far, but I did design the invitations and other party printables on my laptop. Since I don't have photoshop I was determined to figure out how to use microsoft word and excel using a few tutorials from pinterest and some good ole clip art.

So, I can't take credit for the awesome pinwheels. My friend Emily and her hubby made them for her little boy's first bday this past summer and used the same color scheme. She was so sweet and let me borrow them!

Here's the table. So, I must admit that I get obsessed with all those pretty party tables I see on blogs and I really didn't know how to make mine look like those. I tried putting a couple of different wrapping paper pieces up and it just looked cheapo so I got a big ole piece of beadboard from the garage. We have a bunch left over from Landon's nursery and I love how it turned out! I got the snowflakes from the Dollar Tree and spray painted them red, designed and printed the banner on cardstock at home, made the table runner with some wrapping paper and covered it with transparent contact paper (so the food wouldn't mess it up), and spray painted the cake stands I made for a previous cake customer. As you can see, it was a party on a budget!

Here is the seat for the guest of honor. My friend Raeanne let me borrow her antique highchair...love it! I don't want to give it back ;) The hat, oh how I love the hat, was made from some fabric scaps and a cereal box. I found the tutorial here but gave it my own spin by doing an appliqued number one on it before putting the hat together. I also made the little pom pom on top.

I designed the little cupcake toppers and made the cupcake sleeves out of scrapbook paper. They were triple chocolate cupcakes...yum yum.

 

 

I loved making these little penguin cake pops! I always get aggravated when I make cake pops because I have a difficult time with the chocolate hardening before I have used it.  I found this awesome tip on pinterest that suggested using a mini crock pot (the little one you use to keep dips warm) and it made the process sooo much easier. I used a little ice cream salt to keep the cake pops standing up in my ice cream dishes. I love how it looks like ice (something else I found on pinterest).

 

 

AND here is the guest of honor's little smash cake! I made the cake topper out of polymer clay so he will be able to keep it forever. His little face always lights up when I let him play with it. A few years I taught all of my 5th graders how to make little clay penguins and this sure brought back memories.

 

 

And here is one of my fave cakes yet! Polar Bears are my favorite animals and I have been wanting to make a bear cake for a long time. My friend Taylor got me this AWESOME Build-A-Bear cake pan a few years ago and I had yet to use it. I was so happy I got to finally put it to use and I hope I'll be able to use it for many more cakes! I'll try to do another blog post where I explain how I put this little guy together.

 

 

Haha....I think this pic is so funny. Landon grabbed the cake before we were even able to put a candle in it! Everyone ran over to sing Happy Birthday before he devoured the whole thing.

 

 

 

 

 

Don't stick it up your nose silly little guy!!

 

 

Here's the hot chocolate bar, but I don't think anyone had any because it was 72 degrees outside! Not the best weather for a Winter ONEderland ;)

 

 

A closer look at Landon's Polar Water...

 

 

 

One of my favorite activity at the party was making snow!! We bought some snow from the Teach Me store and it was awesome. The kids loved it and Landon is still playing in it. I found this swimming pool, literally, in the middle of the road...it was a perfect color and size :)

 

It's a little difficult to see, but the mantle has all of L's weekly pics that we took of him this past year. It was so neat to see them all together and printed out. I used some picture frames that I got for yardsales, spray painted them and attached some jute twine and hung the pics with little mini clothes pins. I LOVED how they turned out and it was sad taking them down.

 

I made the Igloo out of a big piece of cardbaord we had saved from when we bought our kitchen table. I spray painted it white and drew the ice blocks on with a sharpie. It was supposed to be a picture prop, but I am not sure how many pics got taken in it. We still have it up for a Christmas decoration.

 

 

 

 

 

And last, but not least, here is the Penguin Adoption Center! I bought all these little penguin beach balls from Oriental Trading and the kids were able to play with them at the party as well (another pinterest idea :) )

 

 

And there it is!! I hope that everyone had fun cause I know we sure did. I know Landon won't remember this day, but I hope we have a lot of good pics for him and maybe one day he'll be able to look back and see how many people love him and came to celebrate! We love you Landon David Eshleman!!