Elmo loves to celebrate!

Elmo loves a good party! These cakes were made for a sweet girl who loves the furry red creature. A big cake for her guests and a smaller smash cake for the birthday girl. I like to think of them as Elmo and Baby Elmo cakes!

A Bee-tiful 1st Birthday!

I was thrilled to be asked to do the smash cake and cupcakes for the first birthday of a sweet little girl turning one. Her mom had a great yellow and black bee themed bash for her. I love those colors and what a sweet idea for a 1st birthday party in the spring!

Who says cookies have to be boring?

When I was a kid I always went for the chocolate chip or peanut butter cookies, the sugar cookies were always the ones that seemed to be left over.  They were never anything exciting so it was always easy to pass them right on by. 

When I was asked by a local photographer to make cookies for her grand opening I wanted to do something fun that would catch people's attention. Memories By Jenny does lots of photography, but has also found a nitch in doing boudoir photos so I thought these corset cookies would be perfect.

I found an amazing sugar cookie recipe for the sugar cookies on Annie's Eats that you can find here. It uses fresh lemon zest and vanilla bean in it, they are so yummy and moist!  Annie's Eats also has a great tutorial on piping royal icing onto the cookies and then flooding the cookies with the rest, you can find these tips here. It was like decorating 75 mini cakes for me....quite time consuming but the final product was awesome so it was all worth it.

As if 75 of these cookies weren't enough...I also did 25 fish cookies for a friend who was throwing a baby shower.  The baby shower had a fishing theme for the soon to arrive baby boy.  The cookie cut outs I used were actually suppose to be whale cookies but I made them work as fish.  Even though the shower is for a boy, I wanted to add in some girly touches since the party was also honoring mom.  The cookies were then packaged up with a cute little fishing bobber and handed out as favors.  Too cute!

Mirror Mirror on the Wall...who had the greatest 4th birthday of them all...

My beautiful 4 year old had a fun filled Snow White Party. She is a pretty typical 4 year old girl in that she is obssessed with the Disney princesses. After going through several possible princess party themes she settled on Snow White, of course insisting that Snow White actually make an appearance. I love the colors of Snow White, the red/blue/yellow combination is such a vibrant color collection so I tried to incorporate that as much as possible and not be too 'commercial' with the party. Of course Pinterest is another great source for ideas! That where I got some of the cutest ideas, like the apple cupcakes.

For the cake I wanted to do something different than a traditional Snow White cake. Last year I did the doll cake for her Tinkerbell birthday so I didn't want to do that again. When I saw this idea on Pinterest I knew it would be perfect, especially with the trademark red bow on top that makes everyone think of Snow White. The cake was a triple layer chocolate cake but only six inches so it still was petite enough to fit into the tea party theme.

Dessert tables are always my favorite party when planning any party event. I'm always looking for new ideas and creative twists on traditional treats. On The Sugar Diva's website I found cute stripped and polka dotted straws that were fun for the drinks and also for the marshmallow pops. They have a ton of colors but I of course stuck with red, blue and yellow.

Since a big part of Snow White takes place in the woods I purchased some moss mats and log stumps. I wanted some apple trees as well but since I was making apple cupcakes I made my own apple trees. I found The Pastry Pedestal on Pinterest and thought it would be a perfect way to display the cupcakes amongst some branches.

I kept the food very simple. Tea sandwiches with fruit and chips. I served the fruit and chips in small blue and yellow cups so each girl could take what they wanted.

For the actual tea party table I rented a small, child size banquet table with twelve little chairs. Perfect for the 4 year old guests, but also would have been perfect if any of the 7 dwarf's stopped by. I am really into chevron stripes right now so I got a great chevron striped runner and then chevron napkins that were folded with a flower. An eclectic collection of tea cups and some party favors finished off this amazing table.

A real Snow White was the topper for this party. My daughter and her friends were so excited when she arrived. Snow White read stories to the girls, painted faces and taught them proper tea party etiquette. She also crowned the birthday girl "Princess for a Day."

I used some amazing vendors for this party! Here is list of the vendors and the products I used:

Oriental Trading Company - lanterns above the dessert table, goody boxes and apple lables.
C & C's linen company - Chevron napkins
The TomKat Studio - fruit cups and small white boxes (on the tea party table)
The Sugar Diva - striped and polka dot straws
Speciality Bottle - lemonade bottes
Save on Crafts - tree stumps and moss mat
Ashley's Party Inspirations - invitations, goody bag labels and favor tags
Fairy Dream Wear - the birthday girl's outfit (she does lots of designs and themes)

Thank you to everyone who made this party possible!