I love planning parties. I’ve got multiple plans for some fall parties – with school friends, with out-of-town friends, with church friends, for Ben’s 7th birthday – in the works, but first I wanted to share with you more about Rachel’s first birthday party.

When I was brainstorming a theme, I wanted something that would go with her happy, joy-filled demeanor. I ended up choosing rainbows and loved the bright pops of color …

• Invitations – I introduced the theme with the invitations I made. Honestly, making invitations is one of my favorite parts of party planning.
• Cake – My friend Courtney made her cake, which was layers of brightly colored cake.
• Candy – I bought all sorts of colorful candy and sorted the pieces into mason jars. We had red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple and pink candies – and let me tell you, blue candy is hard to come by! These were decorations during the party and then were poured into treat bags for the kids to take home with them.
• Balloons – Rachel eyes balloons every time we’re in the grocery store, so Ben and I picked out a dozen balloons for her. (They’re just $1 each at The Dollar Tree.) What a good purchase that was – weeks later they’re still inflated and tied to the back of her high chair.
• Food – I made a rainbow out of fruit to go with our hot dogs and cheese puffs.
• Paper products – Paper plates, napkins, and tablecloths were easy to find at Oriental Trading. Plus somewhere along the way, I picked up some rainbow striped containers for forks and spoons.
• Perler beads – I needed an activity for the older kids (my two, cousins, and my best friends’ kids) so when I saw these at Michael’s craft store, I knew they’d fit the colorful theme.
• Prize – We had a game that involved people identifying 12 pictures of Rachel by month. The prize was a notebook and a package of colored pencils.
• Shirt – I bought Rachel a rainbow shirt from The Children’s Place for her to wear during her party, which she did until after the cake. Although I took her shirt off, she still required a bath after digging into her cake!

The thing about a baby’s first birthday party is the theme usually isn’t dictated by the guest of honor. My other kids’ first birthday parties were planned based on when they were – Cate’s party was on Derby Day so we ran with that theme and Ben’s was in November on the same day as a Murray State football game so we went with a tailgating theme. I loved their parties, so I wasn’t sure what I would incorporate in mid-September that still felt like summer.

Rainbows worked for us as we celebrated our happy girl, who loved having her people all together – although she was a little unsure what to think about everyone gathered around singing “Happy Birthday” to her. But in third-child fashion, she went along with the party and adventure.

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