Sadie's Rainbow First Birthday!

I'm so excited to share that Sadie is a one year old! I can't believe how quickly this year has flown by, and I never stop thinking about how immensely lucky we are to have a happy, healthy, silly little daughter. Even if she overtired or sick with a cold, our little miss Sadie is so happy - I wish I could have her sunny outlook on life!

Ok, onward to Sadie's first birthday party! We chose a rainbow theme because Sadie is such a bright, sunny little girl so it only made sense to feature bright colors. And since I always love to know all kinds of details (where, what, how), I'm going to be incredibly thorough.

Party Timeline
The party was scheduled from 11am-1pm. If I could go back and change it, I would shift it to a little bit later to fit better with nap schedules - Sadie barely napped that morning, and the other kids at the party didn't either! Here's a rough timeline of how things worked out that day:

11am: Everything for the party was set and guests started arriving
11am-11:15am: I got Miss H up from her short nap, gave her a bottle, changed her outfit, and brought her up to a room full of people (she loved it!)
11:15am-11:45am: guests mingled, kids played
11:45am: We dressed Miss H in her Korean hanbok (traditional dress) and did the doljabi ceremony
12pm: We gave Miss H her smash cake and then cut the big cake for the guests
12:20pm: We helped Miss H open up her birthday gifts
1:15pm: The last guest left and it was time to clean up!

Food
Since the party was over the lunch hour, I wanted to make sure we had somewhat substantial food. But I also wanted to make sure everything we made wasn't temperature specific (i.e. didn't need to be served hot) and that everything was easy for us to prepare ourselves. To top it all off, we had one guest who is gluten free and one who is vegan and gluten free. We served:

• Egg salad finger sandwiches
• Cucumber finger sandwiches
• Black olive tapenade crostinis
• Mediterranean quinoa salad
• Chips and guacamole (which many of the babies enjoyed too!)
• Skewers of fresh fruit (rainbow colors, of course!)
• Cake pops
• Cake
• Izze sparkling drinks
• Bottled water
• Applesauce pouches for the LOs

There was more than enough food for our (roughly) 15 guests and everything was budget friendly!

Details
The details of the day are what I'm most proud of! I spent a lot of time gathering items, making various pieces of decor, and just trying to create a rainbow theme that was fun and bright. And I'm proud to say that I did all of my planning, crafting and baking when Sadie was sleeping - I never prioritized anything over her.

I've been blogging Sadie's week-by-week photos we've taken, so of course I wanted to share these photos at the party! These are 5x5 prints that we hung on twine and attached with mini clothespins. We hung these low enough on the wall (the top row is about 6 feet high) so that our guests would easily be able to look at all of them. It was fun hearing people comment on what their favorite photos were and how much Sadie has changed!



I made cake pops the Monday before the party. These are great treats that can keep for a week, so they're easy to make in advance! I'd found this little planter with a chalkboard on the front from an Etsy seller (their shop is currently unavailable) and I thought it would be so much fun to have "cake pop flowers" in it!



The "Happy Birthday" banner on the wall was by the talented Chelsey Emery, who also did the party invitations. It was a perfect addition to the room and I love that we can easily save it and use it year after year! We hung it with the same twine we used for the weekly photos.



As mentioned above, we prepared all of our food ourselves for the day. I decorated the table with scalloped paper circles punched out of cardstock in all colors of the rainbow!



I ordered spoons and forks from Sucre Shop, napkins with rainbow dots from Target, and plates in rainbow stripes and solids from Oriental Trading.



As mentioned above, we served Izze drinks (in all of the flavors they have for great color variety!), and bottles of water (which I may or may not have wrapped in washi tape purchased from In The Clear), and applesauce pouches for the kiddos.



Favors were copies of the book Planting a Rainbow and little individual pots and seeds (found in Target's dollar aisle!) for growing their own flower. Since we only had 3 children as guests at the party, I could afford to gift books.



I fell in love with the look of paper rosettes! I used this tutorial for them (there are many tutorials for rosettes if you look; it's a pretty simple concept), found cardstock in solids and patterns, and afixed them to the wall with removable mounting tape. I was worried about them not staying on the wall, but I hung them 2 days before the party and only one had fallen off the wall a day after the party, so we did really well! It was an inexpensive piece of decor that added a lot of fun to the room.



I found these fabulous rainbow colored bottles/vases on Etsy (also from the shop where I got the cake pop box, shop currently unavailable). They were incredibly affordable and so much fun! I plan on keeping them up year round in our dining room. The day before the party I bought white spider chrysanthemums for each vase.



Korean Doljabi Ceremony
After all of our guests had arrived, Steve's mother and grandmother helped me dress Sadie in her traditional hanbok that they had gifted her. It was a bit large on her but we were able to tuck the sleeves under. She did amazingly well in the dress!



For the doljabi, you set items out in front of the baby and the item they choose indicates something about his or her future. The items we opted to use were: a pencil (scholarly), a tennis ball (athletic), a paintbrush (artistic), money (good fortune), and string (long life). She hadn't seen any of these items before so we knew she wouldn't be playing favorites!

I predicted she would choose the paintbrush and Steve  thought the tennis ball. I was right! After some pondering, she touched the paintbrush, then took her hand back. And then she went for the paintbrush again. It looks like we have a budding artist on our hands!



Cake!
The cakes were a labor of love, as I made both of them. I like the idea of making her birthday cake every year as something special that I do. I made banners for the cakes using washi tape, baker's twine, and paper straws. The big cake said "Sadie!" and the small cake said "One." (They're hard to read because I used metallic pens and it was really sunny). I'm going to do a follow up post and share the recipes I used and the decorating tutorials that I referenced.





We put Sadie in her high chair (in her "Rainbows Make Me Smile" t-shirt, naturally) and the smash cake right in front of her. She eventually decided she would touch the cake...



...and even sample some of the buttercream...before she picked the whole thing up and tossed it on the floor! I had been borderline worried about her shoveling a lot of cake her mouth and then choking on it (morbid, I know), so part of me was relieved that she wasn't that into it. She was definitely fun to watch!



After Sadie had her cake, it was time to cut the guest cake! I always enjoy the "big reveal" when a cake is fun on the inside.



I was incredibly pleased with how vibrant my rainbow colored layers turned out, and how neatly they were stacked!



I had been planning this cake in my head since January, so it was incredibly rewarding seeing it come to life, and it was even more rewarding sampling the delicious cake!



We almost forgot a family picture! So here we are at the very end of the day!



And that, in a nutshell, was Sadie's rainbow first birthday party! It was such a wonderful day and it was worth all of the prep and hard work! Keep your eyes out for a more detailed post on the cakes, including the recipes and tutorials I used for inspirationg, baking, and decorating.

Happy birthday to our little "Say Say!"

Sadie at 11 Months

Our little girl is growing up! I wanted to get this 11 month post down before her big "12 month omg she's a year old" post, as she turns 1 in just a few days. Parenting over this past year has been absolutely amazing and so much fun. I can't believe how much she has grown and how awesome her personality is. We've been so blessed!

Nicknames: Say-Say (given to her by her nanny), Sade, Boo-ba
Temperament: Happy as always but definitely starting to show us when you don't want something (like, you know, batting a full spoon out of our hands when you're done!)
Things I Could Do Without: See above! We've had a whole lot of food landing on the kitchen floor (and us!) lately.
Item/Toy We Love The Most: Your balerina doll. I love how you give her hugs and kisses and roll around on the floor with her.
Item/Toy You Love The Most: Your stacking rings. You could be entertained for hours with those rings - clapping them together, crawling with them all over the house, giving them to us. You even tried to give them to grandma and grandpa over Skype!
Things I’m Loving Most Right Now: You play with us so much more - you've played peek-a-boo for quite some time, but now you get great enjoyment out of "hiding" behind your eyes.
Things You’re Loving Most Right Now: Pulling up on all of the furniture! You love standing.
Sounds/Words: Still a lot of "dadda." We've been working on "go" and "Google." You still mostly use "momma" when you are upset!
Foods You Like: Lately there has been a lot of food on the floor as we transition from purees to more finger foods. But one thing you will never ever turn down is toast!

Sadie at 9 & 10 Months

And here we are again, I'm terribly behind on updates! And I cannot believe how big Sadie had grown. She's on the move so much - the day before she turned 9 months she started crawling forward! It was so much fun to see her figure it out (I, miraculously, was home for the first crawl!). She started out slow but now she's speeding all over the house! Which, of course, means we have started babyproofing. It's amazing how quickly she became obsessed with outlets!

Nicknames: Boo-ba-loo, Baby,
Temperament: Happy! So very, very happy. If you're extra tired from skipping a nap you will definitely show your fussy side, but otherwise you are so happy and excited about the world around you.
Things I Could Do Without: Skipping your second nap! You're a little too young to be only taking 1 nap a day, but you are definitely giving it a try lately. You will usually take the afternoon nap for your daddy, but almost never for your nanny and only occasionally for me. Sadie, you need those naps!
Item/Toy We Love The Most: Your play phone. When I say "ring ring" you go and pick up the phone. It's such a fun game!
Item/Toy You Love The Most: Still your jump-a-roo. You could spend hours bouncing around in that thing!
Things I’m Loving Most Right Now: Your vocabulary is expanding even more and you are quick to learn new words/motions (giving a "high five," clapping on cue, waving at "hi" and "bye).
Things You’re Loving Most Right Now: Crawling. You love moving around on your own and chasing the dog - you want to steal all of his toys!
Sounds/Words: Lots of "dadda." I'm pretty sure it is now your favorite word and you say it nonstop! Your daddy loves it!
Foods You Like: You are still a fantastic easter! I don't think there is anything we have given you that you haven't loved. Veggies, fruit, toast, oatmeal, lentils, yogurt, tofu, you will eat anything!

Letterpress Sugar Cookies

I've been making a lot of plans for Sadie's first birthday party! Party planning for an almost-one-year-old is incredibly fun as you know they will be happy with whatever you choose. So I've been enjoying dreaming up a lot of little details that I will probably enjoy and care about far more than anyone else.

I picked up this letter pressed cookie cutter set a little while ago (you can buy it here). It was supposed to be for a holiday party gift exchange, but when I ended up not attending at the last minute I ended up keeping the set for myself. I imagined all of the fun I would have stamping away creating little letter cookies.

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The set comes with each letter of the alphabet, plus "!" and "&". Each character is a rectangle or a square, which you use to cut out the shape. You then flip the cutter over and press the letter onto the dough, imprinting the character. After baking, you can fill the indented letter with icing or leave as-is. Simple, right?

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I made up a basic batch of sugar cookie dough - any recipe will do. My first batch was a total flop. If you don't press the letter hard enough into the dough, the impression will disappear as the cookie bakes. If you press too hard, you'll completely deform the dough and/or cause the dough to rip. My suggestion is to make a few as a test batch and bake them before wasting an entire tray of cookies (like I did).

And although the instructions provide absolutely no detail, I have a hunch that if you pressed the letter onto the dough first and then cut out the rectangle/square shape around the indentation, you would be able to avoid deforming everything. That's my experiment for next time.

Anyway, I managed to get one batch with really good impressions.




After pulling them from the oven, you can see that while they puffed up some, most of the impressions were still fairly deep (with the exception of the letter "s." You know, the one letter I absolutely want to do, as "s" is for "Sadie.").

I then made up a batch of icing. While it is suggested you use royal icing, I don't care for the taste of royal icing. I ended up making something that consisted of powdered sugar, almond extract, light corn syrup and milk. It tasted delicious and the corn syrup ensured the icing was both glossy and firmed up pretty well (not as hard as royal icing, but definitely set up well enough to stack and transport the cookies without ruining them).

Making sure the icing was fairly running, I tinted it different colors and put the icing into decorating squeeze bottles. From there, I simply filled the impressions with icing. All of the cookies that had really good impressions were very easy to fill.

Voila!

They are far from perfect, which is why I tested these out 2 months before Sadie's birthday rather than 2 days before. I think by the time I do them for the party I'll have my technique completely perfect and will make some beautiful S - A - D - I and E's!

 

Bib DIY: Fashion + Function!

I'm continuing my quest to get sewing projects both completed and blogged! It seems like I finish one thing and I'm right onto the next (with three more projects being planned in my head).

I had a lot of fun sharing our Christmas stockings and the super fun retro dolls I made. But I'm almost more excited to share the bibs I've been making, which are essential for anyone with a drooling, teething baby on their hands! (Sadie is 9 months old with 6 teeth and possibly another on the way, so the drooling never ends in our house.)

I've loved this waterproof bib tutorial from Our Little Beehive. The pattern is great and the instructions are very clear and concise (because who likes cutting out their pattern pieces and then realizing they have no clue how to sew everything together?).

Now, what makes these bibs extra special is the fact that they have three layers: cotton fabric on top, absorbent flannel in the middle and a waterproof fabric on the back. This works so well for us because the absorbent bibs would always leak right through onto Sadie's shirt and the waterproof bibs tends to just be one layer of waterproof material, so drool/water/milk ends up running all over. Fail. This combination of materials means Sadie can drool all she wants but her shirt stays dry.

The materials are simple and inexpensive. I had fun using bright, colorful cotton fabric for the top layer - I had plenty of options in my stash of fabric so I didn't have to buy a thing. For the middle layer I used a cheap white flannel. The back layer is a waterproof PUL fabric (I got mine from Fabrics.com), which is fairly inexpensive.

It can be time consuming to cut the pieces out as you need to cut 3 pieces for each bib, but once that's done they can be sewn together in minutes (perfect for naptime sewing project). 

The size is great for the under 12 month crowd - if the bib is too small it won't cover her shirt and if it's too big she tries to eat it. This bib is just right. And, obviously she's super excited to now have fashionable, functional bibs! Priorities.

Family Photo Shoot - 8 months

Over Christmas we were a little bit north of San Francisco with my family. Before leaving the west coast, we were lucky enough to do a family photo shoot with the amazingly talented Anna Kuperberg!

Sadie was right at 8 months for these pictures and it was just the perfect age: she made silly faces, was very interactive, and had just recently started clapping. We had so much fun during the session and were absolutely in love with the results!

Below are a few (ok, a lot!) of my favorites, although it was really hard to narrow them down. And, of course, all photos are credited to the wonderful Anna Kuperberg.