last weekend, we got to celebrate our little man with our friends + family!
after a year of dunkin donut runs together (we go 2-4 times a week!), I decided to stray away from my usual starbucks-themed fiestas and did a donut-themed party for my little guy! initially, I wasn't gonna do a themed-party.. i realized that this is probably the only year he won't really care about what theme his party is and themes cost money! however, party planning is one of my favorite things to do! it's so much fun -- and so much more fun when there's a theme to follow and draw inspiration from!
i decided to spend as little money as possible and use the craft supplies I already had. with the help of many collegians (thank you!!!), I was able to make most/all of the decor for no cost at all, hooray! it forced me to keep things simple and to let loose + just have fun with the details! it made the planning more enjoyable and helped me to just be excited and have fun.
of course we had to use our beloved letterfolk boards to help fancy-up our party. and these cut outs of asher with party hats were pretty much my favorite things ever.
doljabi is a korean tradition/ritual done at most first birthday parties. in honor of his 1/2 korean-ness, we thought it'd be appropriate to include it in our party! we tweaked our choices a little bit - nurse like mommy, pharmacist like daddy, missionary, pastor, entrepreneur or musician!
one cost-efficient way to decorate a party is to get pictures (that you would want to print anyway) printed and use them for decor! I printed the photos using various photo-printing websites, taking advantage of the deals (1 cent per picture for some places!) and had an industrial-sized kraft paper roll for the backdrop!
the photo station started with the birth box that i made for him when he was first born with a few of his newborn pictures.
so much fun seeing how much he grew over each month!
there was a wall of photos for different events, different "firsts" and special occasions that took place during asher's first year. it was so much fun putting it together and remembering all of the wonderful things we got to experience with Asher this year!
also, can I just say that planning a party for KIDS is sooooo much fun! we had about 50-60 kids attending (so many friends!) and I was really excited to put together fun little things to keep them busy so that the parents could (hopefully) eat in peace..lol!
one thing I was really excited to include in our party was the coloring station! I drew some random coloring pages and printed them at home. I also received bags of broken crayon pieces that my friends weren't using and melted them into lego molds for the kids to use! making them were so fun and easy (and best part was, it cost nothing!)
I had a lot of fun thinking up what Asher's favorite things were during his first year of life. most of them are such random things -- he's such a weirdo!
For centerpieces/main table decor, we made these little donut banners out of construction paper that I already had and hot glued them to shiskabob sticks. We used sensory balls that I had and tissue paper that I got throughout my life (I think these pink ones were from my bridal shower 6 years ago...lol!) to stand them up on the tables. Of course we had to add more of little party-boy ashers.
for the backdrop, we used some random VBS boards we found in the storage room and covered it with table cloths! to keep with the donut theme, we cut out and decorated A LOT of paper donuts (confetti is still everywhere in my living room) and got a few dozen donuts from dunkin's!
I was too lazy to make dohl towers that are traditionally found at the head tables, so we settled with a donut tower.
for the kids, we had the usuals (juice + fruit pouches) but also wanted to do some fun donut-themed goodies. here we have "donut seeds" which are just multigrain cheerios..
and I made these mini donut cookies out of nilla crackers (tutorial coming soon!)
we kept it simple and catered DIY/serve-yourself tacos from El Toro Bravo
which made for a casual but fun, hands-free party celebration!
my in-laws graciously provided us with a AYCE baskin robbins section and some of our guests confessed eating 5-6 cups of ice cream. so awesome!
Asher got to wear a traditional korean hanbok (lent to us by a dear fellow mama, thanks Lin!)
and he did the traditional doljabi to close the party. (he ended up choosing missionary!)
we ended the party with a smash cake. this was asher's first experience with anything super sweet so I was curious how he was gonna be! i made a simple frosted cake with some batter I already had on hand, and made whipped cream with some heavy whipping cream I had leftover.
he loved it so much and his response did not disappoint!
it was a great day and such a fun celebration!
what a year to testify of God's goodness and grace to us. something I really learned this year is that it truly takes a village to raise a child -- there is no way that we could have survived this year without the love, help and support of so many people in our lives. whether it be through prayer, words of encouragement, food/boba drop offs, emergency baby sitting sessions or just coming over to play with asher -- you all have made such an impact on our lives. we are blessed..my heart overflows!
cheers to another wonderful year.
"donut" grow up too fast, little one.
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