Liam and Gibson: Liam's First Birthday Party

Warning: this post is long and contains lots of pictures.

I admit that even though I wasn't really looking forward to Liam turning one, I was looking forward to hosting a birthday party for him! I truly believe the first birthday is solely for the parents, a celebration of surviving the first year. That's why I planned his party with a theme that amused me, because I knew Liam wouldn't care at all.

I chose a Beatles/British theme because I do love the Beatles, and I've always thought a Beatles themed party for a kid would be super cute. I added the British element to it because I thought it would make decorations easier. I was right!

Around the time I decided on a Beatles theme, I also joined Pinterest. Therefore the first logical step in planning the party was to make a pinboard with ideas for it. You can see my party pinboard here. I pinned a lot of things, not with the intention of using all those ideas, but just to get inspiration for the party I was planning. The downside of the pinboard is that it made me dream too big. I got all these fabulous ideas, and then toned it down a whole bunch. I definitely got a little carried away in my head, but thankfully not in real life. My small budget and small apartment brought me back to reality.

Even though I had been thinking about and gathering ideas for the party for a long time, I didn't really start doing any preparations until April. The first thing I did was make an invitation. I tried designing one from scratch, and I think I could've made a cute one, but a coupon code persuaded me to just get them printed through Shutterfly. I designed the picture on the front and then added the text and picture on the inside. I only ordered ten, and with the coupon code, it was cheaper than if I had bought supplies to make my own.

I sent out 9 of the 10 invites (had to keep one, of course!), and really started planning the food and decorations. In the end, I kept the decorations simple and used paper to create them. I am a slacker scrapbooker, so I'm decent with paper. I ended up not having time to do some things I wanted to do like make proper food description cards, but handwritten ones worked out just fine!

Almost everyone we invited came, and we somehow managed to host 27 people (including the three of us) in our small apartment. We moved the TV into our bedroom, and I think that helped a ton with space. There were lots of babies, kids, and parents! I didn't plan any activities because I knew the kids would play and the adults would talk and wrangle babies. I definitely had a great time. I hope our guests did, too. It was a great joy to have all those friends in our home! Liam just had a look of determination on his face the whole time, playing with his toys and checking on the other kids playing with his toys!

All in all, it was a great success, and it was a fun way to celebrate Liam turning one!

Front of invitation

Inside of invitation

Food table and birthday banner

Close up of food table.

The food selections were cupcakes (no clever name for them), Strawberry Fields and Apple Records wedges with Marshmallow Pie dip, Octopus's Garden veggie tray (octopus made out of a red pepper is in the middle), Cheese Cheese Me featuring crackers, Fish and Chips (goldfish crackers and potato chips), and Ringo Starr puffs (star-shaped puffs for the babies).