Searching Out Simple: October 2011

My oldest daughter turned 5 earlier this month. Five. That's one whole hand. October really snuck up on me so the day before her birthday I still had a gift to make for her. She has at least a bakers dozen of skirt so I couldn't do that and being short on time it had to be a quick & easy project. Then I remembered a little cork board I had in my trunk to donate. Let's just say things have been in my trunk to donate longer than I can remember. I don't know why cleaning things out is such a long process for me. Anyway, this was just perfect because I recently made something for my son and she was sad that she didn't have one too. More on his project later. ;)

This was the cork board before, cute but didn't go with her decor. First things first I popped off the cut out in the corner. Then I pained it.

I skipped the sanding and priming, crossed my fingers and hoped for the best. Lucky for me that worked out.

Then I busted out the paper doilies and modge podge. These doilies were a great find at my local dollar store. A large and small pack for $1 each. I've used some for party decorations, now this and I have plenty left. Anyway, I tried to put them on randomly. Which is a struggle with my need for balance and order.

Then I added her name using my Cricut to cut out the letters. When I went to hang it up I realized the hardware is meant to hang the other way. Oops.

So I flipped it. When I tried hanging a picture with a tack I noticed the cork was very thin and the tacks wouldn't be easy for my daughter to manage. With a baby in the house I didn't want to chance tacks being dropped on the floor. So I dug in my stash of ribbon, tacked it on and added some clothespins. Only one letter sized paper will fit on this but she insisted on three clothespins. You pick your battles right?

I can't decide if it needs more doilies. Having more time it would have been fun to paint some different colors and had more layering. The ribbon I used was saved from a diaper cake at her welcome baby shower. And now she's five. One whole hand. Pictures from her shower to come soon.

Thanks for visiting!

Pin It

Linked up at

Where has time gone? It's October already and we're halfway through the month. Back in August I shared pictures from Delilah's cake smash and promised photos of her first birthday party. My apologies. I have been surprised to see comments and even new followers to my neglected blog. If you still read, thank you! Life has been a little hectic around here and I find myself readig plenty of blogs but not inspired to write much myself. I hope that will change soon.

Onto the party! My sweet babe turned one nearly three months ago. I still think the 'baby' time went much too quickly. But before I get sappy and turn into a puddle of emotional mush I'll just show you pictures of what I made and her sweetness.

I changed my mind about her theme a couple of times but mostly I had no idea. I wanted to do something with with strawberries and use reds and aquas. Then I thought a bird theme would be cute since the girls' room is decorated largely with birds. But I didn't love the idea. The only thing I could decide on was I wanted to use pinwheels. So that became my theme - pinwheels! And boy did I run with it. Not one party space was free of pinwheels. I'm thrilled with how it came out.

We were arranging furniture and unsure of how many seats we would need and I was snapping photos mid set up. I laugh at these chairs now because two guests came with three kids and three adults between them. The chairs went back inside as our patio set worked just fine. I made a bunting with large pinwheels (6"). Making pinwheels is super easy by the way - cut squares, cut slits from corner to almost center, fold in alternating corners and secure. I flower brads on the ends and alphabet brads to spell out her name in the center. I'm sure noone else but me noticed that detail.

I also made a photo bunting using a newborn picture, one week, one month and each after through one year. I saw photo banners like this when I was pregnant so each month I took a picture of her with a print out of the month it was. This was much easier to do before she started getting curious and using her hands.

I had the dessert table inside because summers here in the south means flys will come by the hundreds and attack your food. I used a mix of glass and plastic serving trays to serve cubed watermelon, lemon bars, brownie bites, chocolate chip cookies & cupcakes. To avoid issues with her everchanging naptime schedule we had her party in the evening so desserts were fitting. We also had sweet tea, lemonade and water.

I made funfetti cupcakes with funfetti frosting and topped them with little pinwheels (2"). I secured these ones using needle and thread and hot glued them to toothpicks to stick in the cupcakes. I used this printable to make the buntings that hung over the cupcakes from chopsticks.

I used this tutorial to make party favors, though I made mine with two rectangles per pouch so it was bigger. I filled these paper pouches with starburst jelly beans. This candy dish is one of my favorite glass pieces. The bottom is a candy dish and the center is a little vase. The tiny bunting print out also had these little flags, I put "thank you" on the flag.

I had various jars - baby food, salsa, applesauce, etc. that I used to hold flowers and more flags and pinwheels. I had pinwheels of various sizes (2-6") scattered on the table.

The rest of the party was outside so I decorated our back door too.

This is one view of the centerpiece outside - more jars with flowers, pinwheels and flags. I taped these pinwheels to the table so they wouldn't blow away.

The pinwheels in the vases were my favorite. I used this tutorial and was inspired by their use of doilies. I got two packs of different sizes from the dollar store. I used my Cricut to cut out the "D", "1" and "Birthday Blessings". All of the paper, minus the photo banner paper, was from my scrappy stash. Making everything myself and using items on hand helped me keep my party expense low.

Here are all of my kids together. I had blankets out on the grass for the kids to sit on. They enjoyed dessert and played with bubbles. I made the girls' it's a cinch skirts to coordinate with the theme using this tutorial. See the little 'pinwheel'?

This is the only decent picture of her hair clip, also a pinwheel. I put wonder under between white cotton and the blue print then made the pinwheel as normal, sewing a button in the middle.