A few weeks ago we celebrated Ava's 4th Birthday. As most of you know, she came after 4 boys in our family, so of course I loved the opportunity to do something girly here. We keep a lot of birthdays simple around here, so it's been since she turned 1 that I put together a party for her. To be quite honest, I tend to get a little overwhelmed with the party planning process, so I'm generally just fine with the simple option.
However, with Ava being 4, she's very aware and definitley wanted a party. I totally admit, I did take advantage of the fact that she is still little, and unaware enough that I picked the theme, instead of letting her say she wanted a disney princess party. I'm sure that will come soon enough and I'll be stuck! ;) (Yes, my daughter loooooves the disney princesses and I don't fight it.)
My inspiration for this party was the fact that Ava also looooooves strawberries! Like a lot. So that was that. A country picnic party is was!
Plus, it took some of the overwhelming out of it for me since I already had paper items that I had previously made for customers. This made it do-able for me... I could see the light at the end of the tunnel. My boys liked giving me a hard time and said things like...."oh you mean your party mom"....assuming I was wanting to do this for myself. Couldn't be more inaccurate. I truly was only doing this for Ava. I tried to explain, they didn't listen.
Don't get me wrong, I thouroughly enjoyed doing it for her. What made it better is that she helped with EVERY little thing and she was so excited. Ava takes "mommy's little helper" to a whole new level. Not helping is not an option. Trust me.
But enough chatting from me....on with some pictures. :)
The little awning was inspired by a Mandy Lynn party and was super simple to make. Once we figured how to make it work, it really only took about an hour.
With a vintage dresser as a buffet, it really made the sweetest little set up. Not to mention the little cutie standing next to it. ;)
It really was quite simple as far as the food and decoration, but it worked for us.
Ava helped me make a simple bunting out of my Farmer's Wife blocks, twine, mini clothespins and fabric strips. Took us like 20 minutes.
I had another bunting I had made for fall market, but never used, so finally it had a purpose....
I lined the table with a vintage sheet, a long piece of gingham and a few baskets and buckets holding paper items and fruit.
The buckets were at Michael's... I was so happy that I didn't have to order them!
For lunch we had chicken salad crossaints, fruit salad, pasta salad, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and of course the kids could take pears, apples and strawberries from the buckets on the table....which they did.
I made the cake and to my surprise it was really good!
I just used boxed mixes, (devils chocolate and strawberry) but the frosting recipe (down further in the cake post) was from Bakerella! Yum!
We had a couple different lemondades...
I had little side bowls of lemons, limes and mint leaves....
I got the little signs as a free download a couple years ago, but I don't remember where. (if you know, please let me know!)
I liked this idea I saw on Pinterest for drinks....ball jars, cupcake liners for lids and paper straws...We use ball jars every day for our regular drinking glasses so this was an easy one for me to do. I got the cupcake liners and straws at Michael's.
For an activity, the kids painted little flower pots and planted a flower.
I raided my husbands old t-shirt collection and put those on the kids while they painted. Worked great. Unfortunatly I didn't get a lot of pictures of this. oops! They loved it though!
For treat bags, I used another idea from Pinterest with paper bags, doilies and fabric. I love any chance to use more fabric!
And of course we had present time...
Which made for one happy birthday girl!
And one exhausted mama....
But hey...if she's happy, I'm happy.
The End.
Now I better get myself moving today because my parents are coming into town and I just might have some party decorations to put away first. oops!
P.S. I have to say Thank you to my wonderful sister-in-laws, husband and my boys who helped me so much on party day! I couldn't have done it without each of you! :) For reals.
