Turning 28

For my 28th my friend Linda and I made plans to have an Alice in Wonderland themed party. I got really excited  and may have gone a little overboard with the planning. I decided to have a lot of fun with it and go with a tea party feel and make it more of a Queen of Hearts style table. For the invitations I decided to go with a Royal Decree mailed in a bottle like the one Alice picked up off the table and drank from and then floated through the door into Wonderland in.

For the bottles that were mailed I printed the "Read Me" logo on the shipping label and left off the ribbons. Then I got to work on plotting the decor. I decided I needed mirrors, playing cards, and topiaries with roses. I bought white roses and painted them red with craft paint so that it would look obvious, like the playing cards in the Queen of Hearts garden. I then bought two topiaries from Michael's and some strands of Ivy to make them thicker and after thickening them up I attached the painted roses to them for center pieces.

For other decorations I bought a large mirror and several smaller ones to place on the table and playing cards to be made into a house of cards, or two. After I got all that together it was time to think about the food. Obviously if I was planning to have a tea party style event I'd need tea party style food. So instead of a real cake I bought mini cakes. I also got fruit, Madelines, mini crab cakes, shushi, spiral sandwiches, small glass bottles of coke, Perrier, and as a finishing touch we made sugar cookies that said Eat Me on them.

 At the last minute, literally, I decided to make a few Wonderland Signs...

And of course, what would a Queen of Hearts tea party be without a game of Croquet?

Here's a few more party pictures for you to enjoy:

As I went through the planning stages of this I would get really excited and tell someone all about my plans and they would always seem to have the same question, "Um, you're planning your own Birthday party?" to which I would always respond "Yes? Why wouldn't I?" I love to plan and I love the feeling of having it all come together, so why would I entrust my own party to someone else? Especially when I hope to some day have other people entrust their parties to me.