I had been working on the Apple of Our Eye birthday decor for awhile. I try to do things a little at a time because I have grand plans.
I found two “Apple of Our Eye” parties. The first one had an etsy shop and went more with the theme I wanted, so I purchased the entire package. I didn’t want all of the food to be focused around apples, but I did want some touches. I also took some things from this party as well. I’ll do food on another day/post, but I included apples but didn’t go overboard.
The Apple of Our Eye package made things super easy. I printed everything at staples on either cardstock or computer paper.
I also took from this party the apple tea lights, colorful flowers in blue mason jars, apple sangria, blue rustic picture frames and apple butter as one of our favors.
From the second party, I took the idea for the cake, m&m “apple” favors, tags/straws, plastic forks/knives display in chevron paper and apple lanterns. I wanted to make a “Olivia’s apple stand” sign, but it was just too much and not needed.
Apple Tea Lights: The apple tea lights were super easy. I went and bought 15 apples. I used local macintosh because they were cheapest. We took a tealight and put it right on top of the apple. Then used a knife from a pumpkin carving set (the small thin, long one) and cut around the tea light, basically tracing it. Then we used a melon scooper to scoop out until the tea light was flush with the top.
Plastic Ware Display: For the plastic forks & knives, I put in a long pink dinner napkin folded and then put the fork and knife on top. I bought the bags from here to display them in. I also bought the straws from here. I cut out the party squares from the party pack I bought and glued them onto the green chevron paper. I bought the apple orchard box from Home Goods. It was like $5 and I couldn’t pass it up.
Apple Lanterns: I bought 6 Martha Stewart pink lanterns, 2 pieces of green cardstock, 6 wooden long dowels (from Michaels) and green thin duct tape. I made a stencil of a leaf (hand drawn) and cut out 6. We covered the top of the dowels with the green tape, put the lanterns around it, then tapped in the leaf. We also put clear packing tape at the bottom of the lantern so it wouldn’t fall.
Chalkboard Poster: This was SO SO easy and CHEAP. I followed the exact directions from Caroline, so use them! The only thing I will say is make sure you don’t have a lot of apps/windows open and save it! It closed down on me once and I have to redo it. I saved it as a PDF and sent it to Staples like that. It was $3.00 and perfect for the party. People LOVED reading it. We nailed it into a wooden pallete along with 2 photo collages I made on Shutterfly.
Monthly Photos: I also copied this idea from Caroline. I loved it! I just printed out her monthly pictures 1-11 (since she’s not 12 months yet) and displayed them in two different area. One on our trellis when you walk in and one on a tree in the backyard.
Other random things: I bought 3 burlap runners from Michaels for some of the tables. I had some prints for the 3 other tables I used under the flowers. I also bought the blue mason jars from Michaels with a 40% off coupon. I saved the paper flowers hanging from the trellis and the tree from Liv’s baptism. I figured I may use them again. After 2 uses they were well worth the effort it took to put them together. (They’re now in the trash!)
I bought 5 bunches of flowers from Trader Joe’s. They were like $5.00 a bunch and so pretty. Luckily I had the tables and tableclothes from Farmer’s Markets. I bought a couple paper ones from Costco for the food table. I bought the 3 frames from Home Goods.
I don’t know if Liv’s outfit counts as decor, but the top and bottom were both from Baby Gap.
And that’s it on the decor front! If you have any questions let me know! (P.S. None of the links are affiliate links. Just wanted to make it super easy if anyone is interested!)
I had an absolute blast putting this together. I had a LOT of help from my sister, so I obviously have to give her credit!
