Hostess with the Mostess

I am so excited I just have to brag a little. Today Henry’s Wild Rumpus birthday party is being featured on the Hostess with the Mostess blog!! Its basically THE place to go for everything party and entertaining and I’m incredibly honored to be featured as a “Real Party”.  Thanks Jen!!

A Wild Rumpus for Henry

It seems like just yesterday that our little man made his speedy entrance into our lives, but its already been a whole year! Saturday we celebrated Henry’s first birthday which was definitely bittersweet for me. I’ve been looking forward to and dreading that day for months, knowing that while I’ve loved watching him grown and learn so much it has gone by way too fast. So, while I know that Henry’s first birthday party isn’t something he will remember, I wanted the day to be as full of joy and celebration as I possibly could. As I’ve mentioned previously, Tim and I decided to go with a Where the Wild Things are theme and give Henry his very own Wild Rumpus.

Being one week before Halloween, I decided to give the theme an autumn spin so I incorporated predominantly orange and yellow color scheme and used a lot of fall leaves. I did my own illustrations of Max and Moishe (or Carol if you’ve seen the movie) for the invitations and some of the decorations, then used puzzles, stuffed animals and toys to bring in more elements from the book. I also found a cute Max costume and a hand painted onesie on Etsy and made him a crown and bib. To top it all off, Tim designed and built the most wonderful one-of-a-kind boat to fit on top of Henry’s new red wagon. The bonus is that we’ll be using it to pull our Wild Thing around on Halloween.

The weather ended up being wonderful and we enjoyed every minute with our great family and friends, and their little ones too. Henry seemed to love all the attention and activity (and his cupcake!) so I would say it was a success. Tons of pictures from the big day below.

Happy birthday sweet little boy.

Wild Things Fever!

As I’m sure many of you are, I am SO excited for the new Where the Wild Things Are movie. It comes out in theaters in two weeks and the trailers are just stunning, not to mention the soundtrack which I’ve been listening to and loving (Karen O from the Yeah, Yeah, Yeahs). Well with the timing of the movie and our little guy’s 1st birthday one week later, we’ve decided a Wild Rumpus would be the perfect theme. I’ve found a bunch of cute ideas online, especially here, here and here and all the parts are starting to come together. I found a cute Max costume on Etsy and some great party favor gifts for the kiddies. Plus Tim and I even got some shirts for the theme over at UO. To top it all off, there are plans in the work for Henry to even have his own replica of Max’s private boat – on wheels!

Here’s a sneak peek of the invitation and stay tuned for pics after the big event.

henry’s room

Believe it or not, Henry’s nursery has been done for a while and was all ready and waiting for him even though he showed up a couple weeks early. However, it wasn’t until the evening before he was born that we got around to taking some photos. So, I’m finally able to share with you some pictures of his new room.

Here is his dresser/changing table and rocker. On the wall are vinyl wall dots and the framed artwork is by Creative Thursday. The changing pad, boppy cover and curtains are all in Lotus Full Moon Polka Dot fabric by Amy Butler, sewn by yours truly.

The crib bedding is Mod Dot by Skip hop and the cute rocking horse was Tim’s as a child, hand crafted by his grandfather.

I love this cute little lamp. Above the chest is the latest in a line of number prints I’ve created. Also, you may remember that the chest, along with the dresser, used to be our bedroom furniture. We loved the way the white furniture worked with the turquoise walls and so we left it in tact for Henry and we moved into the former computer room. I’ll eventually share photos of that room redecoration once we get some loose ends tied up.

There are some more detail photos of Henry’s room, right here.

thank you

As promised, although later in the day than I had hoped, here are the thank you cards I recently designed. The dots and the color scheme are straight out of our nursery decór and the elephant and giraffe are inspired by all the cute artwork I’ve seen and hope to add to the room.

So, THANK YOU to all my wonderful friends and family who’ve showered us with so many cute baby gifts, and hopefully you’ll find one of these in your mailbox soon! Sorry to spoil the surprise :)

new blog header

I’m quickly working on some designs for a thank you card for all the baby gifts – yes I know I’m very late getting them out. I want something sweet and simple that goes along with the decor of my nursery and I think this cutie pie giraffe and ellephant with multi-colored dots is just the thing. So in the meantime I’m trying it out on the blog. Stay tuned for the card designs tomorrow.

a little bittersweet

As I mentioned previously, we’ve started to switch around our rooms for the baby. So as not to forget all the work we put into our home as a newlywed couple, we took some shots of our two bedrooms in their current state for posterity.

The turquoise room was our bedroom and although the white furniture has been great, we feel we should graduate to something more adult. So we’re passing the furniture and the room on to the baby, with a new crib and rocker of course. The thing I think I’ll miss most is the quilt on the bed. The colors in our new room will be much more muted and a little less feminine, so I’ll be packing up the quilt and saving it for a time when we have more than two bedrooms.

The bright, and I mean bright, orange room is the guest bedroom and office. This room will become our bedroom, with a much more toned down and tranquil gray for the walls. I’ve always loved the way the orange walls go so well with the dark furniture, and the shelving above the computer desk is my favorite. Although the bright orange isn’t all too relaxing for sleep, it is quite energizing during late nights glued to the computer, plus we’ve never really had that many overnight guests anyway. Luckily our living room is almost the same color palette of this room in reverse. It has dark brown walls and orange accents, so at least all the orange I’ve collected will have a new place to live.

I have loved owning and decorating our first home and have spent a lot of time and care on each and every room. So, while I’m endlessly excited to redecorate, I still love the rooms for what they are and I am a little sad to see them go.

graduation party invitation

To celebrate my little brother’s graduation from the University of Notre Dame, my mom threw one of her big bash parties. The house was decorated stylishly in ND blue, green and gold, complete with an ND cake and some leprechaun shaped pasta salad. She even splurged on a beautiful flower arrangement for the food table. I’m always amazed by the decoration my mom thinks up and finds the time to execute. She is one tough act to follow and I know my skills in party planning have a little ways to go to measure up.

However, one thing I was able to contribute was the invitation design. As the resident family stationer, I had the assignment, I mean pleasure, to create an elegant invitation for the event. I’ve learned from past experience that although mom and I are capable of elaborate folds and die cuts, in most cases, simpler is much, much better. This one was a piece of cake and I think it turned out very nicely.

head of the table

If you’re hostessing any kind of party or get together coming up and need some fun inspiration, you should head on over to head of the table, one of my favorite daily reads. My friend Kim has a great eye for theming and decorating and on her blog she offers great ideas for showers, holidays and parties just because.

ps. check out her sweet new header art :)

independence day, st. louis style

If you’re in St. Louis and looking for some good old-fashioned Americana this Friday, then march yourselves downtown to watch the 131st annual VP Parade. You can download the above image as a printable pdf here.

(Who, you ask, designed that oh so festive poster above? Why your’s truly of course!)