Chloe will turn 1 in 3 days - 3 days!! - and her party is next weekend so I've been busy getting my craft on.

I'll be the first to admit that sometimes I go a little, um, overboard with the party details. I swear the sickness started with our wedding 3 years ago - but that's what happens when you have a year-long engagement to plan the biggest party of your life... you end up spending too much time on projects like these and these. I find it so much fun though, to come up with a theme, to find all the bits and pieces to make your vision come alive, to use your hands and creativity. I know that Chloe is much too young to appreciate all this effort but I'm hoping somehow a little bit of this party will burrow itself into her long-term memory (and if not, I will have hundreds of photos to help her recall the day!).

Speaking of photos, I have taken thousands of photos of Chloe over the past year. I wanted a way to display them at her party so her guests could see how she's grown over the past year. But I also wanted to incorporate them into something special, something that Chloe could enjoy too when she gets older. So I've made up these notecards, 3 to 4 cards for each of Chloe's birthdays from age 2 to 18. I'll be asking each of the guests to pick a card and write a little note to Chloe. I think it will be a fun tradition... each birthday, Chloe will get to read some cards and see not only how she looked as a baby but also read the sweet messages from her friends and family and see what they dreamed for her future.


This was pretty easy to put together. Using an old canvas my brother painted years ago (he no longer wanted it and we were going to donate it to Goodwill so someone else could enjoy it), I covered the frame in some fabric. I used thumbtacks to attach the fabric to the wood. Then I strung ribbon across the fabric and also held that in place with thumbtacks. I made the notecards in Photoshop and found the cute flowered clothespins at the dollar store.



So pretty. And more importantly, nice little memories of Chloe's special day.