Braysen's First Birthday Party

I knew that Braysen's birthday party would be stressful, and I thought I was quite prepared. As it turns out, I really had no idea! Shortly after Braysen was born, I had his 1st birthday party narrowed down to 2 ideas. I'm so glad I went with the pirate idea, because my friend is doing the other one for her little boys' party at the end of this month! By January, after Christmas, I was in full-swing party mode. I liked the pirate theme, but was not too thrilled with some of the decorations I saw. It was either geared towards babies and was too babyish for my taste or was for grown ups and was too scary-looking for a first birthday part. That being said, I ended up making a lot of the stuff for his party.. After making one banner and realizing how horrible my cutting skills are (as if I didn't already know!) I broke down and bought a Cricut with my Christmas money. Get ready for an overload of pictures! I decided to put all the goodies on my cake blog, so you can find them here. Nicole at Touch the Heart Photography came out and took pictures. It was such a relief to not have to worry about my camera all day!

If you didn't already know, I'm a DIY type of gal. Sometimes if there is something I want, instead of buying it I try to see if I can make it myself. I found some really cute pirate cupcake toppers on another blog that I wanted to make but could not find a skull graphic that I liked. Everything I found was too scary looking. I broke down and decided to ask for help, and I'm so glad I did! Rhiannon at Doodlebug and Dimples came to my rescue. I owe her big-time! She was able to (very quickly, I might add) find a graphic and design something that looked almost identical to my inspiration photo. I ended up not using them on cupcakes, because by the time the party came around, my plans for the cupcakes changed. I used them on centerpieces, on the sticks for some of the goodies, and sprinkled some of them on the goodie table. I made the centerpieces and the table runners.

 The infamous "Amy-cut banner". All of the paper items after this banner was cut by the Cricut.

The first thing I made with my Cricut!

 Hard at work. I was so stressed at this point, I have no idea why I am smiling.

One of the best things we did? The bubble machine!