Pinwheels Birthday Party: Della's 1st!

I think I might have started planning Della's first birthday party before she was even born.  Ok, maybe a few months later. But still.  This is a big deal! You only get one first birthday party! I started off with a color scheme in mind which ended up being a pinwheel and color theme which ended up being a pinwheel and  lots of colors wildflowers theme.

Have you all seen the expanse of party inspiration that seems to exist in blogland these days? I mean there are tea parties and slumber parties galore, and they all seem to be in the forest these days.  And they are all absolutely stunning. But how does the host have any energy after moving all that furniture to the forest to actually enjoy her party?! Maybe she's a super hero.

But I'm not, so I tried to stick with something slightly more simple: a very scaled-down, no-forest, I love to eat and spend time with my friends-type of first birthday party instead.

Oh, and did I mention that at my one year old's birthday party, there was only one guest under the age of 21?  Yeah, that. So how do you plan a birthday party for a one year old when all but one of the guests are of adult ages?!

First, you thank your lucky stars you don't need to plan Pin the Tale on the Donkey or Musical Chairs just yet. Maybe that will be next year--when all of our friends with younguns haven't recently vacated a 100-mile radius of our party.

Second, you make sure the food is good, because adults like food. (and really good birthday cake!) That, however, is a topic for another day on another blog.

Third, you try to make it pretty, so everyone can enjoy the festivities of celebrating a beautiful little girl and the life God has given her.  For us, it was the pinwheels (and flowers from the market).

I bought the double sided paper for the pinwheels here. These are a fun afternoon project (really they take no time at all!)  Here is a super easy tutorial to make the pinwheels,

I also ordered a little extra paper and made a garland. I just used a scalloped-edge circle punch to get the shapes, and then sewed them together with a little extra thread in between each set to get this just right.  I think this is one of those easy decorations I will be making again. Plus I used a paper that can be used multiple times since it is high quality and super cute!

I also made some tissue pom poms, but they looked nothing like what I envisioned so I'm forgoing the pictures!

There was quite a bit more I wanted to capture, but with all of the fun going on the day of the party, my hands (and brain!) were typically too full to grab the camera.