We could not have asked for a more perfect day to host Hadley's 1st birthday party in our backyard. 70 degrees and sunny at the tail end of September is a rare treat in Michigan!
In keeping with the bird/tree/nature theme I was going for, I decorated with burlap as the table coverings and also to cover the straw bales I used for seating. The wrapped and embellished "H" was featured on the cake table. The Happy Birthday banner I made for Arden's pink party made a reappearance as part of the little backdrop I made with our old wooden fence gate behind.
The cakes were made by Linda Lewis, owner of Once Upon a Wedding Cake. I was thrilled to have her make cakes for Hadley's party as we were so pleased with our wedding cake she made five years ago. The little smash cake for Hadley was French vanilla cake with whipped cream and fresh blueberry filling. You'll see below that Hadley went nuts for it!! The bigger cake for the rest of the guests was lemon cake with raspberry filling; the same combination we had at our wedding - yum!
For food, I made spaghetti "nests" by twirling angel hair pasta on a fork and then setting several fresh mozzarella "eggs" - little perline mozzarella balls into each nest. There were also gummy and sour gummy worms, a fruit and yogurt parfait station, fresh veggies and dip, cocktail weenies and a special dish called pigeon droppings. It's just onions, mayonnaise, mushroom stems & pieces, and swiss cheese in a pie plate and baked, but if you've ever had a near miss with a pigeon or a seagull, you know what it looks like...
The birthday girl looked a picture of loveliness in the party dress I made her, if I do say so myself! It sure was a good thing I used elastic for the button loops, though because she sure is stretching the boundaries of the size 18 month I made her. I did decide to add an orane flower to the waistband, but in the business of party prep, I forgot to pin it on her. Her little headband ended up around her waist for part of the party, so that worked just as well. The headband was some more of the elastic from Pick Your Plum and an orange denim rolled fabric flower, a turquoise rolled fabric flower from some dress scraps, and a little singed petal version with a button in the center. She left it alone for long stretches and then suddenly would decide it had to come off - now!
Our birthday gift to her was this little Pewi ride on by Ybike. She has taken to it strongly already and uses the front part as a walker and also straddles it to ride and scoot around. It's on caster weels so she can go wherever, and they roll well enough to even go on grass. The only drawback so far is that Arden also really likes it and wants to ride on it, causing a few tears on her part.
Hadley was true to her nature and played the perfect little hostess; smiling and waving to everyone. We had fewer guests than we were planning for, which contributed to a nice low-key event. The only downside is we have a ton of yummy cake left - oh darn!
So here are the best part of any first birthday party - the cake smash series!! Hadley put on a perfect performance - tentative at first, looking at us to see if we were really going to let her have at the cute cake I set before her...
... the first taste, with only her fingertips catching some of the yummy frosting ...
... "hmm, that was tasty - maybe I can just put the whole thing in my mouth?" ...
... and finally double fisting handfulls of cake and smashing them into her mouth ...
Here's a little gif file showing the smash in motion.
The aftermath. Both Dave and I sampled her cake and those fresh berries and whipped cream were to die for. Hadley found those and mined for them the rest of the time.
Daddy giving her some off a fork - how civilized!
This photo is hilarious because it looks like she's saying "I can't believe I ate the whole thing!" and about to lose her tummy, but really we took it away shortly after the photo above and she was fine and dandy the rest of the day.
