The Birthday Girl

Well, Miss Norah certainly enjoyed herself all week long during her Birthday Week! She was able to taste delicious treats like cake and frosting and ice cream. She got adorable new outfits and fun new toys to play with. Just the way a first birthday should be.  And on the day we chose to celebrate her birthday, she knew the show was all about her!

Photo by Scott Benz

It started with a birthday tutu, which she adored and has continued to wear for dress up all week :

Mama made the tutu for her to match her #1 onesie, and I'll probably post a tutorial for the steps in a future post. Super easy, inexpensive and a no-sew project! 

Her cake was something that was important to me to be special, made from scratch and as beautiful as it was delicious. I decided to go with a ruffled frosting technique, because I thought it was girly, festive, and simple enough to do, but would have a gorgeous effect. I used an Italian Buttercream frosting (Recipe here) and a chocolate cake recipe I found online (here). It was delicious, and the Birthday Girl thought so, too! Norah got her very own mini cake, which I made using a round cutter and cut two layers from one pan of cake, and frosted just like the big one. I used striped paper straws to hang the cake banner, which was a free printable found here. The banner said "Norah is 1" but the letters were white on pastel paper, which didn't show up very clearly in photos. 

I used baby wooden blocks scattered around the table for decoration. I had an awesome flash card style banner all ready to hang up, and didn't bring anything with me to hang it on the wall...so it never made it up :( 

I had food labels for all of the items written out on ruled paper like the Aa is for Animal Crackers, but again, a detail that didn't really get put together, and didn't get photographed at all. Oh well! 

Photo Courtesy of Scott Benz

Photo courtesy of Scott Benz

On the main table, I used these large alphabet cards and spelled out Norah, and scattered alphabet beads on the table as confetti. The food labels at least made it this far!

Party Girl loved opening gifts, of course! She was so excited for herself that she kept clapping and getting up to run around with a streamer of ribbons and bows! 

Photo by Scott Benz

Photo by Scott Benz

At the end of the day, without a nap and after all the craziness of opening and playing with gifts, the sugar high and low of her very first cake, and the excitement of seeing so many people in one place, Miss Norah was tired and ready to crash. 

Photo by Scott Benz

Even though I didn't get to a bunch of the details that I planned...which was disappointing to me on some level, Norah loved her day more than I could have imagined and more than any of the little details would have mattered to her anyway. I wish I had more time to get everything done the way I had pictured in my head, but at the end of the day, it was a great time and the birthday baby was happy, and that is all a mama can ask for.