party planning

Tomorrow is my dad's 70th birthday. He is such an important part of my life and I can't wait to throw him a birthday party to celebrate this milestone. I've been searching for fun summer party ideas.

There is a great tutorial for these adorable pinwheels at Better Homes and Gardens.

And, this refreshing white sangria recipe is from Real Simple magazine.

This sweet no-sew banner comes from Paper n Stitch.

Finally, unique "thank you for coming tags" , for sale at Perideau Designs' Etsy shop, would finish any party with style.

Any other summer ideas?

ice cream social

Two weeks ago we hosted a party after my daughter's baptism. As I mentioned, we had a good old fashioned ice cream social. It was a huge hit. It was so fun to see all of my relatives making delicious sundaes. We ended up going with Brigham's and they did an amazing job. We had six flavors of ice cream, hot fudge, butterscotch, strawberry sauce, oreos, reese's, m+m's, heath bar, jimmies, walnuts, whipped cream and cherries. All for a little over $200 for 5o people. Not a bad deal at all.

I made tissue paper poms and little tent card labels for all of the fixings. We were lucky to have an absolutely gorgeous day. In all honesty, as a full-time working mom of two I probably took on a bit too much by inviting so many people. I was down to the wire and quite stressed but in the end I truly enjoyed visiting with everyone. What a joyous occasion!

ice cream sundae party

We're having a baptism for my daughter in a few weeks and we wanted to invite our whole family which works out to about eighty-two people. I was stressing over how to feed that many people on a budget and came up with the idea of a make your own sundae party. Fun, right? Well wouldn't you know it that once you start thinking about something, the universe serves it up to you. I was just beginning to plan the party when I came across this adorable design for a sundae party at Eat, Drink, Chic (via Truly Smitten). So cute! She has downloadable templates for all the little tags and signs. I hope mine will be half as delightful.