Firstly, can we just take a minute because I cannot believe my little girl just celebrated her first birthday, where did that year go?!
Secondly, I shared a couple of photos of her party on Instagram and got a whole host of questions about where I got my inspiration from and how I organised her sweet treat table, so I thought the best thing to do would be to jump on here and tell you guys all the what’s and why’s and how I organised and styled her first birthday party.
But she won’t remember it…
No, she won’t, but I will., her family will and all the people who love her will. I know she won’t actually remember the day but she will see photos and so because of that I wanted to make a big deal for her, so she knows how loved she has always been.
I’ll start by saying I am not a Pinterest mum usually, I am a wing it mum, but I did get a little excited about pulling this altogether. Like I said, I know her memories of this will purely be from the photos so I wanted to make sure that she will be able to see all the little details I put into it. I had decided I wanted to create something with a pink, white and gold theme and I really loved how it turned out.
The Sweet Treat Table
The sweet treat table was the main attraction and the thing I was most excited about. I am not sure where I got the actual idea from but it was probably a mash up from sweet tables I have seen at weddings and something I saw on Pinterest, but as with most things I do I just made it up in my head.
I set aside the sweet treat table away from the main food so it really stood out on it’s own and also placed it where everything could see it as soon as they arrived. I picked a variety of goodies, not a single one suitable for a one year old (sorry Hadley), and set them out on different cake stands.
Some of the sweet treats I set out:
- Mini Krispy Kreme Iced doughnuts
- Krispy Kreme doughnut holes
- Fresh cream lemon & chocolate sponges
- Strawberry & Chocolate cupcakes
- Party Rings
These are just some ideas you could use when setting up a sweet treat table – I bought all of these and didn’t make any of them myself.
The birthday cake
Let’s put this out there…I am not a baker and I was 100% not going to bake her cake because in all honesty I don’t think I am very good at things like that and I definitely don’t enjoy it. But things happened and I decided that it was going to be the best option for me to make it for her and actually I ended up being quite impressed with what I created. I made her a 4 layer rainbow cake with buttercream icing and it was actually good and everyone else said they liked it too – so either it was a good cake or they were just trying to make me feel good, and I’m happy with either option. I bought her cake topper from an Etsy shop called Oh So Glitter and a 1 birthday candle to decorate the top of the cake and it sat in pride of place on her sweet treat table. After the birthday girl blew her candle out share had her first slice of cake and I think she really enjoyed it. Although I wasn’t keen on making her cake at first I actually really enjoyed doing it for her and will make it a yearly tradition that I made her birthday cakes. Maybe I will become a baking mum after all.
The food
For the party food other than the sweet stuff we did a small table with sandwiches and savoury options. Nice and simple and enjoyed by everyone.
The guest list
I didn’t want to throw a huge first birthday, I didn’t want to hire a venue or catering and I didn’t want to make it a huge thing, just something simple, tasteful and with all the people who love Hadley so much. We had just family and it was the absolute perfect day.