1st Birthday Ducky Theme!

As I searched the internet for ideas for my munchkins first birthday, I noticed a lack of imagination for the rubber ducky birthday theme!  So I have decided to share what I came up with in hopes of giving others ideas as well.

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My little Cecelia loves rubber duckies.  She has since she was introduced in the bathtub to them.  Now, besides just the rubber duckies, she loves everything ducky!  She crawls right over to any books that contain ducks; especially, the duck and goose series!  I even got her a large rubber duck down at the shore.

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So I didn’t want to go overboard on her first birthday since she won’t remember it, but…of course we had to have rubber ducks everywhere!

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First, I made Cece a 1st birthday dress. You can click here to see some of the details however right now I do not have a full tutorial. If you are interested in purchasing one you can private message me.  My Etsy site is upcoming.

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First I thought to myself, well if it is a rubber duck party, then I definitely need rubber ducks for favors!  So I searched the web for the cheapest, yet best rubber duckies for about 35 people.  I ended up going with an assortment of 2 inch rubber ducks from amazon.  There were some bad reviews that they were not a good assortment; however, I found them very varied in theme.

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Last minute, I decided to make birthday crowns!  This tutorial can show you how to make easy quick crowns!  Of course, if you have a large amount of kids coming you may want to just buy party hats or completely skip this.  I used scrap pieces to make the crowns and just did ribbon along the bottom that could be tied.  You of course can do buttons, Velcro, or if you know the head size, sew it all the way around.

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Next, of course I needed party decorations!  I didn’t want to spend 10 dollars for 8 fancy paper plates with cute ducks on them.  So, I made a trip to my dollar store and bought yellow napkins, plates, cups, and silverware.  They also had cute I’m one plates, so I bought a couple of those as well.  Since the weather is nice, we had lots of tables outside and I bought yellow tablecloths.

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As far as balloons, I ended up buying balloons on amazon, ones with little ducks on them and then two large Mylar duck balloons.  They did not carry these type at my local stores.  The only place around to fill the balloons was the dollar store.  Do you see a theme here?  **Note: it does cost more to have Mylar balloons filled, so if you are saying a buck or two you can skip the Mylar and go for the regular smaller balloons.

 balloons

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I also used the rubber duckies to decorate everywhere!  I had a couple mums and vases in the house and added little ducks to them!

IMG_2559 IMG_2560Food…of course this is key for a party.  I wanted to save some time but not spend too much money either.  So, I decided to order a couple small party trays and then do crock pot recipes.  I didn’t go crazy with the duck theme food since there weren’t a lot of kids coming to the party.  However, if you want to see some duck themed food check out pinterest for lots of ideas.  Yes, we did deviled eggs and some quacky snack mix that I used small duck cups for.  Cake. Originally I was thinking of making my own cake, there are tons of ideas on pinterest.  However, with more than 40 people coming, and cheap but tasty sheet cakes with a free smash cake included, I decided to save myself the stress and space in my fridge, and order a cake with a duck theme.  However, let me show you some of the ideas I picked up from pinterest. 

cake2 cake3Duck Birthday Ideas: click for more pinterest ideas.

I was GIVEN THE WRONG CAKE WITH NO SMASH CAKE when I went to pickup the cake two hours before the party!  I was given a mere 1/4 sheet cake (wrong size) with the wrong duck design on it, and NO smash cake!  Don’t panic I told myself as my mind reminded me I only ordered this a month in advance to make it was done right!  After several minutes of panic, the manager apologized and stated they could make my cake and smash cake in about two hours.  I agreed but would have to send someone else back to pick it up.  Lukily, my brother in law agreed to pick it up and got fifty percent off the cake.  Phew, added stress you don’t need!

I ended up addin some small ducks to the smash cake! Note: it was a HUGE SMASH CAKE!

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I also made duck shaped cookies with a duck cookie cutter!  And then I used yellow icing to make the number one of them!  Half were pumpkin sugar cookies and the other half regular sugar cookies

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Drinks. Duck punch of course!  There are a variety of recipes to make blue punch.  I ended up doing half blue hawiian punch, half 7up, and then putting in vanilla ice cream to make it look like bubbles!  You can clean rubber ducks up well and put them in, or freeze them in ice!  I also had a punch server that I put ice and ducks in the middle and then put water in it! 

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Play.
Since there were a handful or two of kids coming, I decided to buy a couple items and also set up items for the kids to play with.  Of course we had games such as bean bag toss, bacchi ball, redneck golf, and Frisbee setup for adults.

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I bought some duck beach balls off amazon.  They came in a 12 pack so I got them cheap enough and gave them away as favors too.

Birthday chalkboard!  I love this idea!  And it is so easy to make!  Now again, I needed to save myself some time with this project, but also not spend too much money.  My handwriting is awful, so making a chalkboard myself was out of the question.  I also wanted it on a poster board to have it as a keepsake.  So if you are into graphic design you can make your own up and have it printed at an office store.  However, I am not into graphic design so I investigated the options at etsy.  I ended up going with a 5.99 graphic for ducks and edited the sections myself with adobe.  I took it to staples to have it mounted on a poster board and enlarged.

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HOWEVER, **Note: the file was locked due to the seller having a password.  The staples I went to could not print it so I had to have it turned into a JPEG.  The seller offered to do it, but I didn’t want to wait, so I just changed it myself on a free online program.  Just type in change to JPEG and you can easily find a free site.  For these pre-made designs you cannot change the pictures or the design, only the words can be edited.  For mounting on a thick foam poster board and enlarging to 16×20, it cost me 16.99 online.  I am very pleased with the way it turned out and now it is displayed in her room as a great keepsake!IMG_0108 IMG_0154

You can of course buy a chalkboard and make your own.  You can even print out different fonts and trace them onto the board.  You can also buy a cheap graphic design program and make your own.  Again, for the price, and since it was last minute, it was easiest for me to order it.

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So that is it folks!  Although she won’t remember this, I have lots of pictures and we had lots of fun!

Hope you enjoyed the post and I hope it gave you some good ideas!  You can check out my pinterest site for more ideas!  Follow us on facebook too!

 

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1st birthday dress!

I wanted that special 1st birthday dress, but not that especially high price that comes with most of them!  So once again, I searched pinterest, etsy, and other sites to find ideas.  I ended up combining ideas, as well as making up my own, to design with the dress I created. The theme was rubber duckies for her party.  Therefore, I wanted to incorporate duckies as well as other birthday fabrics.  I went to the store and examined numerous fabrics, buying  a yard of my favorites!  The extra fabric I ended up using to create the crowns!

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I purchased the iron on birthday 1 and ducky from etsy.  The number is even personalized with her name!  I also bought the duck buttons from the store.  I used white hair bands that I cut to make the loop holes for the buttons on the top of the shoulders.

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So how did I make this dress?  Well that’s a secret! But I can give you some hints.  If you are truly interested in a dress like this you can private message me or come back and look for my future etsy link!

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The skirt of course took the longest because of the detail.  I added yellow ribbon in between the rows as well.

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Then I added the cute duck to the back of the dress.  Personally, this dress could be used as a 2 in 1 dress because the back is also so cute!  However, the 1 in the front personalized this as a 1st birthday dress.

 

IMG_2457Well check out the other tutorials, as well as the 1st birthday party theme page for more ideas! Feel free to share pictures of your little one’s first birthday dress!

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Easy Birthday Crowns!

Want to sew quick and easy crowns for a party or get together?  Then you’ve come to the right place!  I made a last minute decision days before my daughters’ first birthday party that we needed crowns!  The theme was rubber ducky, so I decided to make birthday crowns instead of hats!  Young kids and babies don’t enjoy hard hats on their head and also shouldn’t have a rubber band or elastic around their neck.

IMG_0058 (2)As you can see they are very cute for photo shoots as well!  She didn’t particularly like keeping it on, but I got a couple good shots!

As usual, there is a YouTube video and also a written explanation below.  I didn’t have a lot of time to embellish the other crowns but you can always spice things up with some ribbons, bows, glitter, rhinestones, or buttons!

To get started you need:
1) Choice of fabric and design
2) Scisscors
3)Thread
4) Closure for crown (velcro, button, ribbon) or you can sew all the way around if you know the exact size

 

  1. Cut your fabric for the main part of the crown 4 1/2 x 18 inches
  2. Snapshot 1 (10-7-2015 8-50 AM)
  3. Make your own crown pattern by drawing the top on a piece of paper and cutting it out!
  4. Cut your design onto your fabric to make the shape of your crown! If you want a felt backing with another color cut that out as well.
  5. Next, pick out your ribbon if you are using one, if you want any other embellishments get them ready!  I made a felt duck that I sewed onto
    the crown.
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  7. Line up your crown pieces and sew all the way around!  Then you are done! If you want to add button loops and buttons you can sew them on as well.
  8. IMG_2478Congrats and enjoy the party!  Check back often for new crafts or subscribe below!

 

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