Van's 1st Birthday

 Our little Van-Pooper celebrated his first birthday in style.
Mom went all out this year (naturally) to give Van a memorable and fun party.
The Sock Monkey Theme came as a result of his love for his sock monkey stuffed animal that Aunt Holly gave him. From there I searched, designed, printed and cut every single decoration. It was a lot of work, but so worth it.

 At first he was a little hesitant about the smash cake, but he got in there like we knew he would.

 During Van's Happy Birthday song Joey went running and crying into his room because he thought that Van was the only one to get any kind of dessert. Someone loves them some cake!

 The focal point of the party, the candy bar. The blanket hanging on the wall was my first experience at sewing a quilt. I know strips are kind of cheating, but it was a good first project.

 I was lucky to find that Fabric.com had actual sock monkey fabric so Van's birthday hat and vest was made with this sweet little theme in mind.

 Sandwich bar. Everyone loves sandwiches right?

 For the kids we had a station set up to make puppets.

 The Sock Monkey cake pops were a last minute addition. Aunt Holly did the trial run on these, and after we realized that they weren't to complicated to do, they becme part of the candy table.

There were a lot of itty bitty details that went into party. I was able to tie in most of the pattern paper from a digital kit I bought on etsy. From there I just used photoshop elements to design everything from the invites, to the banner, the cupcake wrappers and everything in between. I felt a sense of accomplishment being able to say that I designed the majority of the party without having to go to party stores to buy sock monkey themed products.