Henry's 1st Birthday Party

Henry had a fantastic 1st birthday party!!! He enjoyed his first cupcake, without even making a huge mess. Here are some photos of the decorations from the day of the party. Enjoy!

I primarily used the Under the Sea clip art set (mentioned in previous post about the invitations) from MyGrafico to make the signs and decorations, but I did mix in a few plastic and more realistic crabs from Michaels. If you're interested in using the invitation or some of the printable decorations for a shower you're hosting, please visit my Etsy shop . I will be very happy to work with you to customize colors and text!

I also placed some coastal grasses in bunches down into small vases I already had on hand, and filled the vases with sand to hold the grass in tight.


I made many sized versions of this crab. For the fishbowls I just printed him out twice, taped him together and used some thick floral wire for "legs" that I could use to stand him up in the sand. I did the same thing with the little starfish in that same clip art package. It's very similar to the technique I used for a Woodland Baby Shower.

I always add the Martha Stewart tissue paper pom-poms into my party decorating plans. This time I made some very small ones (which I've done before but used them as flowers in a centerpiece arrangement at the Sweet Mod baby shower) to use in the little mobile from my dining room light fixture. Once again I just cut out smaller sizes of the crab, starfish, and a number 1 that I made in photoshop and hung them from the light with fishing line.

For the desserts I used Graul's (a local grocery store in Baltimore--Mays Chapel location) bakery for the cupcakes and they did a fabulous job!! I took a print out of the starfish and crab and they replicated them on the tops of the cupcakes. In the beach pail I made "sand cake", which is just a vanilla oreo and vanilla pudding version of dirt cake (instead of gummy worms I threw in some gummy fish I found at The Fresh Market).

My friend Candy (who makes fabulous things--see for yourself!) made the super cute red and blue stuffed crabs that are on the buffett in the dining room.

I also made a little sign for the front of the house, announcing the location of the party for guests who had never visited before.

I made two different types of favors. Some for adults and then some for the kids. I made little labels for both.

For the adults, I gave out crab shaped cookie cutters (Candy's idea).

In the kids' bags, I placed a cookie cutter (which can be used to cut sandwiches, or play dough, or make pancakes, or cookies) along with some lollipops and a handmade coloring book (see the coloring pages below).