Pink dinosaur birthday party {Customer creations in the spotlight}

I recently received a picture from a sweet customer, Kathy, who hosted a pink dinosaur party for her little princess. To celebrate her daughter's second birthday she set up this adorable dessert table using cupcake toppers, food labels and a custom made matching banner as decoration.  

Thank you so much for the picture Kathy, it's wonderful to be able to see your party come to life.

Warning: Dinosaurs are back! {shop update}

Boys just love dinosaurs, don't they?

My son seemed to have a slight obsession with these oversized reptiles from age 3 to 7. Birthday party gifts were easy: books, jigsaws, toys, ... as long as it had a dinosaur on it, you couldn't go wrong.

Do you have a little paleontologist at home as well? You could turn his next party into a prehistoric adventure!

• Start off with a dino-mite invitation
• cut out some giant dinosaur footprints or use chalk to draw them onto your driveway
• bury some toy dinosaurs in your sandpit and have the kids digg them up
• go on a dino egg hunt
• serve a variety of bite-sized (pun intented!) foods

A dinosaur party = a roaring good time!

You can find the dinosaur invitation and additional party items in the shop.

Ok, so maybe I could only name the T-Rex and Velociraptor from the top of my head before my son was born (I did watch Jurassic Park after all) but through his adoration for these creatures I also became acquainted with the Brachiosaurus and the Triceratops.  Yes, I admit: it was mainly through watching The Land Before Time with my little guy, but don't you just love Littlefoot?

Do you think girls would fall for a pink version of this adorable dinosaur?

The Perfect Birthday Party Mix

A few weeks back I read an article in the newspaper about how parents are throwing the wildest birthday parties for their children. Some are spending over 1,000 euros to have their child and friends spend a day in Disneyland Paris including hiring a limousine and chauffeur for the day. Now, I'm sure those children had a blast, but is it really necessary? In my opinion, no.

I'm all about throwing BIG and memorable parties, but for me this can just as easily be done at home and on a budget (I definitely come in under the 1,000 euro budget ;).

For me BIG stands for Be Involved Genuinely.

Not sure how to do this? Here are a few tips:

• involve the children in the preparations,
• make decorations together,
• come up with party games,
• be there and take part in the celebration,
• remember to have fun!

Mix up some (or all!) of these ingredients and create your own perfect birthday party mix.

• Get the kids involved and work on the party together.
  The preparations and anticipation are half the fun. Let your children decide on a color or a theme and build your party around that.


• Make decorations together.
  Paper chains are easy and fun to make and if you are not into crafts you can use balloons as an inexpensive and colorful decoration.


• Adapt party games to fit your theme.
  It doesn't have to be a tail pinned on a donkey. Instead, play "Pin a kiss on the frog" for a princess party or "musical islands" instead of musical chairs for a jungle safari birthday.


• Take part.
  Don't hide behind the camera but take part in the celebrations, be genuinely involved, play a game with the kids, dress up (you know you secretly want to), your children will love you for it. The secret ingredient is... YOU.


• And remember, the most important part is to have fun and make lasting memories!

What would you include in your perfect birthday party mix?

A birthday fit for a Princess {Customer creations in the spotlight}

My lovely friend Tanya from Tanya Ryff Photography asked me to design a custom princess birthday party package for her daughter Tayla who was turning 14. She was looking for something simple and modern in Tayla's favourite colour purple. I started with the invitation and sent over some backgrounds, design elements and possible lay-outs for them to choose from. The endresult is a completely custom made invitation, combing all of Tayla's favourite elements.

I love how Tanya added her own personal touch to Tayla's birthday invitation by glueing it onto a hot pink background and adding a little sparkle. It really makes the invitation pop, don't you think?

The birthday package also included drink flags, cupcake toppers and foodlabels and Tanya did such a wonderful job styling the party table using the colour purple as the main theme.

 

If you would like to see more photo's you can hop on over to Tanya's blog.

PS: You can find the entire printable Princess collection in the shop here.

A first birthday in pictures

My baby girl turned one.

There's something magical about a first birthday.

For us it means the first time she can taste cake, watching the amazement on her face when she hears everybody sing "Happy Birthday", making an extra invitation to tuck away in her photo album together with pictures of her first party so that one day she will be able to look at them while we tell her stories of how she gently patted her tiny cake instead of smashing it, how her brother secretely fed her cookie crumbs and how almost all of the guests wore the bows that had been sent out with the invitation (thank you for that!).

That first birthday also marks the end of my baby's "baby year". I admit I'm a little bit sad about that part. But I also look forward to each and every milestone yet to come and will applaud my girl all the way. Just take baby steps my love.

One for the Theme

My mind is still filled with lions, giraffes and monkeys after designing this Jungle Birthday Party so I'm continuing with the same theme and posting some cute Jungle inspired party ideas.

Source: hostessblog.com via Joelen on Pinterest

Source: worldwidefred.com via Anjeanette on Pinterest

Source: s220.photobucket.com via Sarah on Pinterest

Source: etsy.com via Rebecca on Pinterest

1. Everyone could have their own animal next to their placecard. A few could even be used as toppers on the birthday cake. And wouldn't those favor boxes look nice stacked on top of each other in the middle of the table?

2. These drinking cups guarantee lots of fun for small (and perhaps not so small) children.

3. No party would be complete without some cupcakes!

4. And how about this lovely art print as a gift for the birthday child? Or of course, the book itself.

PS: It's the last day to enter the giveaway! Be sure to check back tomorrow to find out whether you won a 25USD gift voucher to my shop!!

Making the switch to FB timeline + a shop update

 

Yesterday I made the switch to the new timeline on facebook. Brand pages will automatically make the swith to Timeline on March 30. Usually I tend to wait till the last minute to embrace changes like that, but now I was brave and switched even before the deadline!  I used a few elements from my latest Jungle Birthday Party design to make my page look more welcoming to visitors (hello new likers!). I'd love to hear what you think of it.

By the way, the full Jungle Birthday Party set is now available in the shop: monkeys swing by, lions wear crowns and the use of bright colours really makes this set pop.  Here are a few examples:

It's very suitable for a boy's birthday party (or for girls who just don't like pink and princesses!).

Shop Update: Spring Flowers (and a few more elephants)

March 21st marks the arrival of Spring here in Belgium and when I think of Spring I think of the early flowers that start to bloom. Little dots of colour appearing in the grass and between the trees, making the days a bit more colourful.

Well, Spring is now not only in the air, but also in the shop!

I already posted a little sneak peek on the blog (with special thanks to the lovely Tanya from Tanya Ryff Photography) but I'm happy to announce that Spring Flower cupcake toppers and food labels are now available in the shop in different colour combinations. So whether you like pink or blue, there's certainly a flower there for you... The food labels are blank and can thus be used for any occasion. The cupcake toppers were designed with Tanya's beautiful granddaughter in mind who recently turned two. They can be personalized with name, age and initial of the birthday girl. And I couldn't resist making another set of cupcake toppers with my signature elephant design for an extra sweet touch (complete with flower behind her ear to match the Spring Flower designs!)

I will leave you with a few more pictures...

Alice in Wonderland Birthday Party

My daughter's Alice in Wonderland birthday party was this weekend and she and her friends had a wonderful time. If you are looking for some inspiration on how to host your own Wonderland birthday party then be sure to have a look at the photo's below.

7 braids in wet hair the night before the party result in this beautiful wavy hair, just like Alice in the Tim Burton movie. The dress was made by me.

One of my daughter's friends is even named Alice!

Happy Birthday Banner.

Of course there had to be a fair amount of teacups, playing cards, hearts and roses displayed at the party.

 

Perhaps you have a cute white bunny lying around? Place a pocket watch or old-fashioned alarm clock next to him for your very own White Rabbit.

Now, I'm very lucky to be married to someone who loves to bake so my husband actually baked this cake himself and I decorated it (the bottom part is fake but it adds to the wow-effect). This was the first time I decorated a cake. It takes some sugar paste (or fondant), some food coloring, a butterfly plunger cutter and some patience.

And yes, we're all a bit mad here...

If you liked the Alice in Wonderland Birthday Banner and placecards that I used and would love your own set: I'll be adding them to the shop so that you can get your personalized party printables here. Invitation and cupcake toppers also available.

Tutorial: cupcake topper assembly

Cupcake toppers are easy to assemble and make your cupcakes look even more delicious (or, if your cupcakes did not turn out great, this will keep your guests looking at the topper rather than at the unfortunate cupcake, brilliant!). Want to add a little sparkle to your cupcakes? Here's how.

First of all, you'll need some tools: with a pair of scissors, a glue stick and some wooden stir sticks or lollipop sticks you have the basics covered.

Of course you will also need some cute cupcake topper designs. These are for my daughter's upcoming Alice in Wonderland birthday party and they can be found in the shop. 

You could use scissors to cut out square or circular shapes, but if you have any punches this will make the assembly go a lot faster and the shapes even cuter. Check your local craft store or search online for circular or scallop shaped punches. A 2" radius is a nice size.

If you don't have any punches you can print out 2 copies of the design. Cut out squares out of one copy and circles out of the other copy.  With a little 3D tape in between they add a lovely 3D effect to your cupcake topper!

And now for the actual assembly of the toppers:

1. Cut away the white strip of paper so you can get closer to the design with your punch.

2. Place your punch so that the design is exactly in the middle and then punch out your shape.

Tada!

Some punches can be used upside down, this is very handy when it comes to punching out shapes where the design has to be centred.

Keep punching and add a little variation in your cupcake toppers by using different punch shapes.

You could even use a corner punch

This would look wonderful as a gift tag when tied to a gift bag with some pretty ribbon. Or use it to make napkin rings!

3. If your printer can't handle heavyweight paper, then you could reinforce your paper with a circle sticker after you punch out the shape. All you have to do now is glue the stick to the back of your topper (you could also use tape) and voila

all done!

Feel free to embellish even further with a little sparkle or tie a ribbon underneath the topper.

And now all you need to do is bake some cupcakes!

This was my first tutorial, I hope you found it helpful.