The Taynors

The Taynors

Friday, February 6, 2015

Winter ONEderland

My baby shower for Patrick was in a snow storm, he was born in a snow storm, most of his early doctors appointments were in snow storms... so it was only fitting to do his first birthday as a snow theme.  I had a lot of fun with the Winter ONEderland party.

We were able to have the party at our new house (yay!  one of the reasons I was so ready for more space... to host parties).  I invited our close friends that had kids and otherwise it was mainly family.  We had about 40 people attend.

Decor-

I wanted everything to be in the aqua, red and white theme.  So I started by contact a friend of a friend who does print work and she set the theme by designing the invitations.  Once we did the invitations, all the other details were easy to follow.  Tara at To a T did an awesome job doing all of the little details I love about parties but just can't do myself (birthday banner, high chair banner, food tents, invitations, cupcake toppers, and thank you cards).








Besides the paper signs, my sister in law made a super cool pine cone garlin and my mom and sister made me snow man center pieces.  Then I just added some snow flakes and balloons and we had ourself a winter onederland.  I also made a "1" photo collage of my favorite pictures from throughout the year.  I did it for Ryan's first birthday and I still love looking at it.  Favors I went through Oriental Trading and just got a bunch of random winter themed things like mini footballs, stickers, stamps, and then filled it with silver hersey kisses. 











Food-

This was pretty easy for me.  I knew I wanted to do a chili bar and a hot chocolate bar and I wanted everything to fit within the winter theme.  I made three different types of chili (white chicken and bean, traditional chunky chili, and pumpkin chili with ground turkey).  Then I added all the fixins (cheese, sour cream, hot sauce, jalapenos, crushed fritos, cilantro, green onions) and let everyone have a chili tasting.  This was super easy because I was able to prep all the food ahead of time, let it just cook in the crockpots all day, and they were ready to be served whenever people wanted to try them.  There was no official sit and eat time, it was a help yourself style dinner.  I included a side salad, macaroni and cheese, and corn bread to go along with the chili.

Dessert was also pretty simple-  I had a friend make the cupcakes for the guest and a smash cake for Patrick.  Both were delicious.  Besides the cupcakes, I had powdered munch kins for "snowballs" and my mother in law brought very yummy Melted Snowmen (kind of like a cake pop type dessert).  But the most important part of my dessert options was the Hot Chocolate Bar.  I made a huge batch of home made hot chocolate and let it stay warm in the crock pot.  Then I put out all kinds of fun things to mix with it... mini chocolate chips, marshmallows, whipped cream, cinnamon, cinnamon sticks, candy canes, and of course Baileys for the adults.  I think it was a success- most of the stuff was gone by the end of the party.





We all had a great time!  Here are some pictures from the actual party-
























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