Birthday Morning Surprise

I decided early on that I wanted to make a tradition for Grady on his birthday mornings with a little surprise waiting for him when he wakes up.  I bought this cart a few months back, and as soon as I bought the cart, I had this vision for Grady’s morning surprise.

I had way too much fun pulling this together, and it pretty much is exactly what I envisioned from the beginning.  I love that it was a great way to display his gifts and show him that this was a special day all about him.

I stacked donuts on a cake stand and had lots of little party animals overlooking the scene. With lots of balloons blown up on the ground for G to play with, we sat around and enjoyed the morning while he opened his gifts and we nibbled on breakfast.  What a wonderful way to start such a special day!

Sources:

The Birthday Hat and tassels along the side were handmade by my super talented mom!

Bar Cart (a bit smaller than most carts out there, but it works nicely for decoration and events!)

Party Animals – I had a hard time finding all the animals in this amazing party hat tutorial  but I ended up pulling them from Target and Michaels.  The best ones (and the ones in the tutorial are Terra animals)

Paper Fans and Spheres

Felt Ball Garland

Cake Stand — My mom had had this for years, but a similar style is here

 

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Grady Turns One!

It’s been quite some time since I last wrote a blog post, but I’ve been a bit busy between work, travel, and life in general with a growing little one in the house.  We have so many exciting things coming up over the next few weeks, so I will try my best to properly document any of those noteworthy things here.

The first of those exciting things is Grady’s first birthday.  I joke with all of my friends that it’s a National Holiday in our household, because it’s literally been something I have been thinking about and planning for a year!!  I know, I am crazy.  But my love for others manifests itself in these ways — planning and creating; organizing and plotting.  Considering the love I have for Grady is greater than any love I have ever had in my life, it makes sense that I have spent the most time EVER on this ‘event’ :).

The first part of G’s birthday celebration includes a photograph session with our AMAZING photographer, Aimee Nelson.  She is literally the most talented and thorough person around and we are so happy she captured Grady’s 1st year of life for us in such  special way.

I do admit that choosing the theme and outfits for a little boy’s cake smash photo session can be super tricky.  I spent quite a bit of time figuring out how I wanted the colors to come together — I clearly wanted it to be blue, but I also wanted it to be bold and dynamic.  My mom helped my vision come to life with the custom backdrop in his photos.  She also created the adorable little “One” cake topper you see in one of the images.  And I landed on the outfits you see from Janie & Jack, Zara Baby, and Polo Ralph Lauren– out of everything out there, they have the most ‘classic’ boy options.  I ended up being very happy with the results!

I have to say, I will forever cherish these images.  They perfectly capture Grady’s transition from a sweet baby boy to an inquisitive little toddler — I see so much of both of him in these images.  How bittersweet it is.