Flynn Family: Ethan's 1st Birthday Party: The Setup

A little over a week later I am finally getting around to this. Ethan's birthday party was a big hit. Due to the heavy photo content and my desire to make those that couldn't make it feel like they were there, this will be broken into two posts. One for the setup and decor; one for the present opening and good times had.

Thanks everyone!!

I would first like to give a big thanks to my sister, Carissa and Mom for helping me make some of the decor and get everything setup. And thank you to Martin for capturing Ethan's big day (the good photos are his, the others are mine). I started thinking about this day months ago, pinning and planning. Ultimately, I am so glad that I decided to go with the Goldfish theme for the special day. The kid loves those things. Few things make him as happy as opening a bowl with Goldfish crackers inside.

Let's start with the invitation that Ethan's Aunt Carissa made for us. They were perfect to set the mood for Ethan's big day. The invitation was covered with a vellum sheet stating "Ethan is O-Fish-ally ONE!" The inside included "Calling all friends from the depths of the sea. This is the one place you will want to be. Swim over to help us celebrate Ethan's first birthday!

Outside of the invitation

Inside of the invitation

Guests were welcomed with this greeting on the door and couple of pictures of the guest of honor on the day he was born and a shot from his smash cake session!

We transformed the dining room with a background of streamers to look like waves. The adjacent wall was adorned with Ethan's monthly picture and a few shots from his one year photo shoot just above the gift/drink table. The gift table was a conjoined with the beverage table. The beverages included bottled water that had personalized bottle wrappers stating "Ethan is One". We stowed the water bottles in an orange bucket to keep them cool. To help keep them cool and prevent the wrappers from tearing when getting wet, we used frozen water ballons as ice. We also had "Ocean Potion", which was blue raspberry lemonade. Some of Ethan's water toy presents also doubled as extra flair on the tables. Fish lanterns were also hung around house that I made out of chinese lanterns and a little bit of felt. Unfortunately, we didn't get a picture of that. One did make an appearance in one of the photos below in the top corner.

Happy Birthday banner that Aunt Carissa made

Gift/Beverage Table

Gifts along with some floating toys

Ocean Potion

Ethan is One water bottles

We found some personalized balloons at Party City

There was lots and lots and lots of food. There were sandcastle sandwiches, saltwater seaweed (spinach dip), sushi (cucumber/avocado pinwheels), seashell surprise (pasta salad), fruit skewers, chicken salad sandwiches, and of course, Goldfish crackers.

The full view of the food table

Goldfish and Sandcastle Sandwiches

Sushi, Fruit skewers

Saltwater Seaweed

We love cake! Ethan got his own cake while the rest of us had cupcakes. This is the first cake I have made in awhile. I really enjoyed decorating it. For the cuppies, guests had a choice of white or strawberry. I decorated them with homemade white buttercream icing. They were placed in the cupcake liners that I made myself. Finally, they were topped with an "Ethan is One" pick and a Goldfish Cracker.