Addison's Fancy Nancy Birthday Party

I used to love planning birthday parties, and then Pinterest came around and made me feel like a fool for even trying!  Don't get me wrong, I love Pinterest for so many reasons, but not many things can knock you down so quickly as taking a few minutes to look through what everyone else is doing and realize that you are LAME.

After taking a little bit of a break from the Pinterest craze, I have a newfound love for it.

For recipes, photography inspiration, people with style leading me in the right direction of what to wear....

AND.

to finding a fabulous party that someone else put a whole lot of work into and was so nice to share and totally copying it right out from under them to create a party that my girl is still talking about....thank you Pinterest.

And thank you Tiny Oranges blog for being the creative one and sharing all of your details with us moms who can take the easy way out with our kids being none the wiser!

I ordered the cute invitation from an Etsy shop 

called Pixel Parade. She was awesome to work with and also helped 

me come up with other signs to use throughout the party.

like this one, which welcomed everybody in style.

Being her 5th birthday party, I figured it was a good year to try and do a "drop off" party.....meaning the parents drop off their kids for some fun, get a few hours to themselves, and you don't have to feed them!  It worked out great.  Except I'm no dummy and begged my amazing friend Joy to be my Fancy helper and stick around for the festivities.

I needed someone to help all the girls get "fancy".

I ordered a bunch of accessories off of Windy City Novelties and Oriental Trading and let the girls pick and choose what they wanted to add to their already fancy ensembles.

We also had a little eye shadow and lip gloss to have fun with as well.

and a mirror.  

You must have a mirror to check out all the fanciness!

For food I kept it pretty simple.  Since the party was from 2-4, we just did PB&J or cheese sandwiches cut into flowers and butterflies....Fancy Nancy's favorites.  We also had Fancy fruit kabobs, cookies,

Birthday chex mix (addictive), 

and Sprinkles pink cupcakes.

 We also had flower pops which were just giant marshmallows dipped in chocolate and sprinkles.

The table was the fun part and so easy thanks to those links that I grabbed off Pinterest.

I borrowed tables and chairs from friends.

I got purple foam sheets and cut them into butterflies for placemats (which the girls decorated as one of the crafts).  The eiffel towers came from Birthday express.

Flower centerpieces were from Party City as well as the poms.

Addison still has these in her room!

Since this was a Fancy Nancy party, I decided to pull out the good stuff.

The stuff I registered for, but have yet to use.......the china.

The girls did great, but I wouldn't have put it out if I would have cared if something did go wrong.

I thought it would just be fun to have a "real" tea party.  And by real tea, I mean crystal light.

I found these silk organza ties off Amazon for an absolute STEAL.

 Addison's dad dressed up for the occasion and helped answer the door....she helped him get ready, even picking out his tie. 

and loved that he dressed up for her special day.

Can you tell that this girl was excited for her party?

  To keep the fun going (and fill the two hours) we had a few crafts/activities planned.

When the girls arrived, they got "fancy" with the accessories and make up.

They also decorated a hat (thank you Target $ spot).

I just cut up spare bows and bought a huge bag of feathers from Michaels.  

After everyone was there we did the first craft of decorating the place mats with jewels and stickers found at Michaels.

I channeled my old teacher self and read "Fancy Nancy's Posh Puppy" to the group.

and then the girls all got to decorate their own puppy dog collar.

The puppies were also found online at Birthday Express.

After snacks, cake, and crafts were done, we played a game that I remembered from a party when I was little. It's basically like hot potato, but you wrap several boxes inside each other with a little prize in each one.  Music plays, present gets passed, music stops, prize is opened.  The girls loved it.

I wrapped up things like inexpensive books, play jewelry, a boa, etc.

Treat time.

  

Graham got to join in the festivities for a Sprinkles cupcake because who am I to keep a kid from Sprinkles? Girls only party or not.....

For favors, I found a cute Fancy Nancy book on Amazon and put a little "Merci" sticker inside from Addison for each guest.

The party was a huge success, most of all because my girl continues to tell me that her was her best day ever.  I can't believe she's FIVE!!! 

But yet I can, because she continues to remind me every day.....