Party Planning Series

Over the next few weeks I will be sharing highlights from parties I’ve hosted. Why? Because I believe in honoring milestones and making time to weave the golden threads of celebration into our lives.

I am no professional party planner and these are not super fancy events. They are at-home get togethers with family and close friends where connection to each other is most important. These ideas are for regular people with small budgets and busy lives, but who care about good celebrations. 

I rarely host parties all on my own. My family is always involved and our buddies continually offer to bring a delicious dish, show up early to help decorate, run an errand, clean off my dining room table piles and generally help keep me on track. Community at its finest.

Our daughter’s first year of life was just sweet. She liked to eat and sleep and smile-a real peach. She’s a bit of a handful these days, but the best theme we could think of for her 1st birthday party was a “sweet shoppe” party to honor her genuine sweetness. Her birthday is right after Thanksgiving when people want to dive into Christmasy things, so a treat party seemed in order.

I made a pink ombre smash cake, chocolate dipped marshmallows, hand made “wrapped candy” cookies, hot chocolate, cinnamon chip scones, cupcakes, popcorn and bought candies of all sorts. We also served turkey/havarti/pesto sandwiches on sourdough with some chips & fruit since the party was over lunchtime and we needed to balance out all the sugar!

We continued our tradition of having a “baby dedication” at our children’s first birthday parties. This practice consists of gathering before God and our church community to ask for wisdom and grace as we raise this person that God has entrusted to us. We commit as parents to love God ourselves and to raise our child in the ways of the Lord. While this is most often done in church before the congregation and we support that as a great practice, my husband is a pastor at a large church and we have enjoyed the intimacy of this experience done in our backyard surrounded by our closest friends and family.