A Birthday Fit for a {Little} Man

Well, Beckett’s birthday was three weeks ago, but I’m just getting back into this blogging thing (remember), so better late than never. Many of you probably already saw pictures from Beckett’s birthday, and may have gathered there was a theme to it. We went with a “Little Man” theme. Yes, that seems to be the trend right now, but that’s not why we did it. See, we have always referred to our boys as our little men. Harrison was, and still is, our first “little man”, and Beckett followed suit. Although, he mostly goes by “Beckett Bear” (not sure exactly why). It was only fitting Beckett’s first birthday would have a little man theme, and I can’t help that lots of people are doing it. I am thankful for all the inspiration out there. No point in reinventing the wheel.

While I purchased some items (mostly food), I used a lot of what we had or free printables that were out there. As our guests arrived, they were greeted at the door with this awesome sign I found via Mama Miss. I actually didn’t take a photo of this, but it looked pretty similar to her image. I didn’t tie any ribbon on mine, though, and I used a bigger embroidery hoop to make it more substantial on our front door.

As everyone came into the house, we had David’s home office set up to receive Beckett’s gifts. We did this for Harrison’s birthday, too. It makes it nice to keep the gifts “out of the way”. It wasn’t an issue for Beckett because he just turned one, and he isn’t concerned with all of that, but once you hit toddler age, it’s nice to have a place to put gifts that isn’t the center of attention. We just closed the doors at Harrison’s party until it was time to open gifts.

The streamers were so easy to make, and I loved how they turned out. Here’s the tutorial I used. I put some in the kitchen, too, but I think it might have had an even cooler effect if I’d hung them all here. I was even thinking an ombre effect would be awesome. I did this the morning of Beckett’s party, though, so I didn’t have that kind of time.

Here they are in the kitchen. Hi, Dad!

The party really happened in the living room and kitchen. Although, I think if the food was in the entry way, that’s where everyone would’ve been. Seriously, my mom and mother-in-law made some delicious dips that were the hit of the party. Next time, I will just serve their dips with vegetable and crackers. I’m not joking.

While I do sometimes wish I had a kitchen I could close a door on when we have guests and I’m running around like a chicken with my head cut off, I do love the open concept of our home. It makes it that much warmer and inviting. Nothing like your close family coming together to celebrate one of your children’s birthdays and enjoying good food and conversation. It truly was a celebration of life and the importance of family.

You can see in the living room pictures, that we had some decorations in there, too. We made that chalkboard frame before Harrison’s birthday, so all we had to do was write a birthday message to Beckett. I just purchased pom-pom fringe at Jo Ann’s to decorate the frame. The tie banner had some of David’s old ties on it along with some pictures of Beckett over the past year. The pictures are from a cool site called Prinstagram. I ordered them before Valentine’s Day along with some mini albums they make. I love to do little things like that to draw people in and get to talking about different events. Always makes for good conversation.

Another thing we did for Beckett’s birthday that we did for Harrison’s birthday was a photo album of pictures over the past year. This is a great way for us to commemorate Beckett’s past year, but it also served as a means for our guests to write birthday wishes for Beckett. I think this will mean so much to him when he’s older, and I love looking back after things have settled down from party mayhem and reading all the notes people left. I ordered this one from MyPublisher because I had a voucher from Living Social. They pop up all the time!

Here’s a few more detail shots. I made the straw bottles with empty bottles, straws I already had, and mustache stickers from the Dollar Spot at Target over Valentine’s. The plastic cups have washi tape on them that I already on hand. While I thought these made for a nice touch, most people just drank from a bottle (root beer or beer), and I didn’t need to do this. Oh well. I enjoyed it.

The cake bunting I made with a free printable from here. I debated making a mustache-shaped cake or topping the cake with mustaches, but in the end, I didn’t want to go overboard with the theme, and decided a simple bunting atop the cake was the way to go.

The cake was just for Beckett, but big brother got some, too. I mean, how could we resist that face?

We didn’t leave our guests out (and we wanted a treat, too). I baked French donuts and donut holes and coated them with cinnamon and sugar. I normally don’t serve my donuts in paper liners, but this was to keep everyone’s hands from touching every donut when they chose what they wanted.

David helped me add the details to the root beer. I didn’t want to serve “soda” because I knew Harrison would want some. I also liked the idea of having beer for adults and “beer” for the kids. Harrison kept telling everyone he got to have a beer. I’m sure his teachers didn’t take him too seriously the following week at school.

I made this banner with plain chipboard pennants. I made one completely from “scratch” for Harrison’s first birthday, and I decided it was worth a few extra dollars to not have to cut all the triangles out this time. I was pleased with the result.

We didn’t leave Truman out for such an important occasion. He was the only one who took the bow tie seriously.

I won’t go into a run down of Beckett’s gifts, but I did want to share a gift Harrison gave him. He picked this out with Grandpa at a flea market. When I asked him why he chose a piano, Harrison told me, “I know Beckett likes music, and he will like the noise it makes.”. It was a winner.

Beckett’s party didn’t coincide with his actual birthday (that was a few days later), so we kept our family gifts until then. We still celebrated, but we just kept things low-key. There was cake, of course. What’s a birthday without cake?!