Yoga Birthday Bash

 All the beautiful photos in this post were taken by Memories by Erin Leigh

 

I have a little yogi in my family.  My now 7 year old, absolutely loves going to yoga class and I love the physical benefits and the calm focus it brings her.  She was especially excited to share it with her friends at her yoga birthday party.

 

I designed a set of yoga flashcards for the invitation and the poster above that welcomed guests. 

 

We rented a dance studio at a local community center.  It was the perfect space for all the kiddos to stretch out and the parents got to watch the entertainment class from a bench along the wall.

 

The party started off with a yogurt bar.  The kids scooped yogurt and chose granola, blueberries, strawberries, honey straws, and sprinkle toppings to make their own yogurt parfaits.  

tutorial to come on the string art backdrop I made!

 

Honey straws from Peace Blossom Candles 

 

After everyone had their snack, it was time to bend, stretch, and twist!  The yoga instructor lead them through the yoga poses by telling stories and having the kids act out animal characters.  The kids had so much fun making fish faces, pouncing like cats, sitting like flowers, rocking their foot "babies" to sleep and the parents had just as much fun watching. 

yoga instructor from Kidding Around Yoga 

 

The parents enjoyed a treat of their own during class, Thai flower cookies.

 

We took a little break part way through class for a craft.  They decorated talking sticks with pipe cleaners, feathers, and beads; one of their own and they each contributed something to one they made collectively.  All the children sat in a circle and the birthday girl in the center.  They passed the talking stick around the circle and each took a turn saying something they liked about the birthday girl. 

 

 Elle's lotus top made by Ahpeele

 

The class wrapped up with meditation time and relaxation.  I don't think I've ever seen my 7 year old lay so still for so long unless she was asleep.

 

 

 

It wouldn't be a birthday party without cake... yummy cupcakes with yoga pose fondant toppers to be exact.

 

 Fondant toppers made by Two Suger Babies

 

All the happy yogis went home with their yoga mat, tied up with a ribbon carrying strap (tutorial to come!), and personalized water bottle.

 

It was so much fun for Elle to share the enjoyment she gets out of yoga with her friends and I'm happy to get to share the fun of planning this party with you! Namaste.  

 

Happy Hour at The Shoffice - You're Invited!

After all that hard work and the many hours we put into designing and building The Shoffice, a happy hour celebration was in order!

Guests were greeted at the front walkway with this chalkboard sign I made (tutorial here).

Outside the Shoffice was a drink station and a giant platter of wings I baked that afternoon and kept hot in crockpots (you'll have to trust me... the wings & condiments and the beer & wine came out after the party started but I did my picture taking duties ahead of time).

But the real treat was in the Shoffice!  My very fun, but typically very office orriented, storage piece became the bar.  For the transformation, I made a runner for the top from chalkcloth, lined the drawers with leftover wallpaper, and opened 2 drawers for the plates, napkins, and the glasses.  The spread included:

homemade guacamole (I posted my delicious recipe including the secret ingredient here), salsa and chips.

Caprese shooters I made with balsamic glaze in the bottom, fresh milk motzerella balls, a basil leaf and grape tomato speared with a cocktail sword

Mojito jellies served in asian spoons on platters lined in the wallpaper scraps.  I made the jellies from the super fun Jelly Shot Test Kitchen book... sophisticated jello shots who knew?!

Hurricane jellies displayed in these stands I made by gluing the domes to chunky white candlesticks and lining the bottoms with more wallpaper scraps cut into circles and laminated (do you recognize them from the 1 year old in a flash party?).

Spiked Limonata with the recipe written on the runner.  2 oz spirit (I served Belvedere vodka and Malibu Black rum) and 11 oz Limonata (not only is the Pellegrino limonata delicious but the cans with the foil tops are so pretty!).  Oh and the glasses for the spiked limonata had little lemon zest knots in the bottom (thank you Martha!).

Birthdays aren't the only milestones that deserve to be celebrated.  Any excuse will do when there's great friends, delicious food, and fun drinks!

 

U-Pick Outfits and Your Way Wednesday

I had lots of fun with the outfits we wore for Elle's U-Pick party! 

My Doug wore (and got lots of compliments on) an "eat your broccoli" organic cotton T-shirt made by the Lady in Blue Shop.  For the rest of us, I couldn't resist the adorable Michael Miller fabric, gnoming around and picked up a yard from Pinked Fabrics on Etsy.  I made Liv's reversible kimono dress using a pattern I bought from Mani-Mina.  It was a fun project, the dress is so flexible, easy to wear, and able to be customized.  I'll definitely make more!

Elle wore a gardening apron just like the ones I made for all the kiddos (tutorial on that to come!) over a jean skirt, and I embellished a tank top to match.  I would give you a tutorial for the tank except that I totally just wung... or winged... or however you say I have no idea how I made it, it just kinda came together, but not as perfectly as I would've liked and I really dislike not having a method to my sewing madness... so there will be no tutorial... k?

I've been looking for an excuse to make myself the Deep Pockets apron from the A is for Apron book, and this was it!  I also wore a gnome scrabble tile necklace Pendentlicious made.  Gnomes up the cute factor by at least 50% on any project!

Can you believe I got all of that done with just a yard of adorable fabric?!

Time for Your Way Wednesday

Crafting is my way to relieve stress & stretch my creative muscles.

Sewing is my way to have some uninterrupted time to myself.

Bentos are my way to show Elle I'm thinking about her.

Parties are my way to love on my girls & our friends

Tutorials show my way of making this or that.

I want to see your way! I'm really excited to give you an opportunity to do just that with a link party!


Only two rules for you:

• Add my lovely "Your Way Wednesday" button to your blog or blog post that you link up to
• Please link directly to your blog post, not a giveaway, your link party, your Etsy shop, or even just the home page of your blog.

In exchange for following the rules, I'll leave a comment on your blog post & if you're my favorite post I'll feature you on my blog for my next Your Way Wednesday.

<br /> <center><a href="http://ellebellecreative.com/" target="_blank"><img alt="Link up you latest project every Wednesday on the Elle Belle Creative Your Way Wednesday link party!" src="http://i1127.photobucket.com/albums/l639/ebcreative/finalYWWbutton.jpg" /></a></center>

 

Vintage Label Can Centerpieces

 

Thanks so much for all the positive feedback on the U-Pick party.  It's always so fun when other people appreciate your vision and are inspired by it!  Speaking of... this isn't the reason for this post, but a good time to mention that Baby Lifestyles contacted me to tell me that one of their readers was inspired by the One Year Old in a Flash party I planned for my Liv last year.  Check out Jess' take on it on the Baby Lifestyles blog here.  If you've done any of the projects I've posted on my blog, I would LOVE to hear from you!

 

Now back to my regularly scheduled post, the first of many about some the details of the U-Pick party.  Today I have a free printable for you and an easy project that makes for really sweet centerpieces, cans with vintage labels.

 

I took some pictures of vintage can labels, resized them to fit standard cans of tomato soup (print some for yourself here), used the soup, cleaned the cans, and glued the labels on with hot glue.  I was originally planning on filling them with baby's breath, but one afternoon as we were walking around the U-Pick farm I noticed a tree on the neighbors property with Queen Anne's Lace growing on it, so we picked some the morning of the party and waa laa a really inexpensive, pretty, and easy to make centerpiece! 

Fruit Dip Favors

I made Elle's Famous Fruit Dip favors for the parents at the U-Pick party.  Read all the details on the Catch My Party blog & print the recipe I formatted to include in a mason jar lid here.

 

U-Pick Party

 

This Spring we discovered a local hydroponic u-pick farm, First Fruits.  The farm is just a few neighborhoods over from ours, right in the middle of the most densely populated county in Florida.  We couldn't believe our luck and took advantage by picking produce there nearly every weekend!  My Elle talked endlessly about how much fun picking was and how she thought that her friends would like it too.  I knew it would be a great experience for the kiddos, something the parents could get excited about too, and would be an opportunity for us to support locally grown food, which we've always been advocates of.  So of course a birthday party came to mind, but my Elle turns 6 in October when the farm is closed... so celebrating the end of the school year was as much of an excuse as we needed! 

I wanted an organic/natural feel for the party and the invites rethink ink made for me with hand drawn illustrations, craft paper envelopes, and seed catalog liners set the tone perfectly!

Since we would be in the Florida sun for the entire party, I decided to host it in the morning, which made for a little cooler day and a kid friendly breakfast menu. The decor for the kid's sit down breakfast was my favorite part of the party!  I set up two 6' kids tables under a tent, over turned plant pots as stools in alternating green & yellow, a vintage seed packet banner strung along one long side of the tent, & a gathered burlap and lace garland along the other (tutorials on each of those to come!).  One short side of the tent was closed off by a "wall" of kid sized gardening aprons I made for each of our guests, hung on twine clotheslines with little name tags attached with the cutest miniature clothespins.

The tables were covered in burlap, with a row of vintage doilies down the center (I bought the doilies from Our Attic on Etsy and realized when I received the package in the mail that they're local!). I picked up the green and yellow square plates  and the watering cans we used as water pitchers at Ikea.  I found the glass jars with the metal latch lids for apple sauce at Goodwill, along with the silverware spoons I used at each place setting, and the parfait glasses I filled with whipped cream.

Also on the tables were vegetable cans re-labeled with vintage can labels and filled with pretty white flowers I stole picked from a tree on the property next to the farm, a burlap lined basket I found at Home Goods, and old fashioned wooden berry baskets I bought from Sugar Camp Cottage on Etsy.

Each place setting consisted of: a place mat that was really just pretty yellow ticking I found at Jay's Fabrics and cut with pinking sheers.  The square Ikea plates.  A real spoon (not to be confused with a plastic party ware spoon).  A canning jar with a bit of twine & a green stripe paper straw from Isa Kay Boutique.  A scallop edge napkin I bought at an online party retailer.  A galvanized berry bucket I picked up at the dollar bin in Target, personalized with the custom vinyl decals Lime Tree Gifts made me, and lined with green gingham fabric I cut with pinking sheers.  And last but not least, the adorable Martha Stewart project - chocolate pudding, Oreo "dirt", mint leaf "plants"... I love me some Martha!  I added a wood spoon/plant stake I stamped with "yummy"

The menu consisted of blueberry (picked from the farm of course!) muffins, apple sauce, fresh berries and whipped cream, and pudding "plants".  I did a separate table for the parents with bagels, coffee, OJ, and fresh berries.  My favorite project for the party has got to be the coffee sleeves I made "Keep Calm and Buy Local"!





After everyone ate breakfast, Shelly, First Fruits' owner extraordinaire (along with her darling husband Jeff & super sweet and especially helpful children), told all the kiddos what was growing on the farm that day and what to look for when they were picking.  Elle gave each of her friends the aprons she had chosen for them, a pair of kiddie scissors, and they all set out into the farm with their berry buckets to pick.

While everyone was picking, I cleared the table and re-set it for strawberry shortcake making.  When the kids came back in from picking, they found 4 strawberries, a strawberry huller (I found those good ol' fashion metal squeezy ones at Montessory Services), and a bowl with a slice of pound cake at their place setting.  They hulled the strawberries, cut them with a strawberry slicer I borrowed from a friend, and topped it with whipped cream.

While the kiddos were making their strawberry shortcake I bagged the produce they had picked in Ziploc bags, and tied it with the gingham liners before sticking it back in their personalized bucket.  They each went home with their bucket of pickin's, a strawberry huller, their gardening apron, and an envelope of these adorable paper craft gnomes (a boy gnome for the boys and a girl gnome for the girls) to make at home.   

can you even get over how stinkin' cute these are?!  I was literally... I'm serious about this... jumping for joy when I found this set in the Fantastic Toys shop!  My very patient and precise husband cut, folded, and glued these for the party so everyone could see just how adorable they are... yes I am that lucky... a good Daddy a sweet husband and he can craft too!

At this age, the parents are just as much part of the party as the kids though and I didn't want to leave them out, so I sent them home with a quilted mason jar of fruit dip, topped with handmade labels with little felt strawberries that Mud & Twig made, and a wooden spoon stamped with "thanks" tied on with twine.

It was such a fun day and I owe a great big giant thanks to lots and lots of people!  I linked to a bunch of them above, please please take some time to check out these wonderful vendors! I put tons of effort into hunting down.  And also my amazing photographer, Dawn of Elemental Image... I'll never stop talking about how worth every penny it is to have someone capture the special moments of the party and all your hard work!  Having Dawn there let's me focus on being a good hostess and having a great time with my family, which despite how wrapped up in the details I get, is actually the point of the party!  I also know just how valuable having someone to bounce ideas off during the planning process is... my good friend Karie never acted like my incessant questions about the most minute details were ridiculous (despite what she may have been thinking ;)), was a huge help the morning of the party setting everything up (along with my Aunt & Shelly's daughter, Kelly), and did so much to help make that day run smoothly.  Thank you all for being patient with me, making my vision a reality, and not calling me out on being the party equivalent of a Bridezilla!!

My Elle's first year of "real school" was such a great experience and a fun milestone, I'm so glad we took the time to celebrate it!