DIY Birthday Party Decorations and Menu

I have been on a blogging hiatus this past week. And if you were just asking yourself, “Yeah, where have you been, Sarah?” here all the details. Well, most of them.

Kevin and I spent the 4th of July holiday visiting my family in Miami. I will share our 4th of July picnic menu with you later this week. We had a great time visiting family and friends.

Last Wednesday was my 25th birthday! Yes, I turned a quarter of a century old. Nothing much has changed and it doesn’t feel different. I am proud to say that I can now rent a car with paying all those extra fees for being under 25. So that’s a plus.

Then on Saturday it was Kevin’s 26th Birthday! You may remember that we were planning a little birthday shindig (the mint and yellow party board may jog your memory).  I made paper straws with custom little flags on them. If you would like to make some for your party or wedding, you can find the tutorial here. I also made little toothpicks with our silhouettes and ages on them. They were so easy to make! I will post a tutorial and a printable template later this week if you would like to make them.

About an hour before the party I whipped up a bunch of paper garland. This was also easy, inexpensive, and so cute! I still haven’t taken the decorations down because they are just so charming.

I spent almost the entire day Saturday cooking small bites and sweets for the party. Here’s what I made:

Black bean and pineapple salsa with tortilla chips
Almond stuffed dates wrapped in bacon
Herbed garlic pinwheel pastries
Antipasto skewers with pesto dip
Carrots, snap peas, and cucumbers with feta dip
Turkey burger sliders with all the fixings

Red velvet cake (My favorite cake and I used my favorite recipe via Bakerella)
Yellow cake with chocolate frosting (I used a Martha Stewart recipe. Loved the cake, didn’t love the frosting. Do you have a creamy chocolate frosting recipe?)
Chocolate brownies

Everyone brought drinks but I did make a delicious peach sangria with prosecco and peach brandy

We put my camera on a tripod and made a little photo booth. It was so  much fun! Next time I will encourage more people to use it. Perhaps by making some props. We moved one of our tv’s to the den and placed it in front of the “photo booth” so people could use it was a view finder. I am going to do a little more research and see if we can have it preview the images as well. Anyone have an expreience with this?

I made the photo booth background quickly using this awesome tutorial via Sugar and Charm.

Thanks to all our friends who attended. It was a great birthday for both Kevin and I.