DIY simple birthday banner

Here's a little sneak peek of Emily's birthday banner that I made for her. It seems like a tradition for me to make her a birthday banner. Last year I made her a simple black and white cow themed banner. This year it was an owl themed banner. It currently spans about 15 feet across our huge mantle. Sorry the picture is dark and I have a cheap camera phone.  It still needs a lot of decorations but its coming along. I still need to fill the glass vases, cover the brown box white, add pictures to the frames, and finally add more pom poms on the wall.

Here are the before/progress pictures taken during the day time. Sorry I don't know how to turn the pictures. 

I work tomorrow but more updates to come soon. I'll update progress of what I'm doing prior to the actual party date.

Family pictures

Aside from planning Emily's party we've been taking a lot of professional family pictures. I think they are so important. Unfortunately we don't have too much time to take them all the time. We took newborn pictures for Emily at 2 weeks and hung them along our wall behind our large sectional and made a photo album from adoramapix.

Recently we also took two smaller family sessions. It has been so hot and humid that we were unable to last 30 minutes. Its seriously tough to pose, try to look good, and have to tell your hyper crazy toddler what to do and what not to do in 100+ degree temperatures. Fortunately we were able to get a few very good pictures. Here are some of my favorites.

I encourage everyone to try to take as many family pictures as you can while your baby is young. They are only young once and once the time is gone, it will be gone forever. I don't ever look at our wedding pictures but I love looking at our family pictures. 

You can view more family pictures from our photog here. 

Early planning for Emily's second birthday

Time feels like its flying by these days. Our Emily is almost two. I'm sad thinking about her growing up so fast. The other day my sister took pictures of Emily and when we were looking at the pictures, I realized Emily looks so grown. Emily is no longer a baby. She's a toddler and going to be a preschooler soon. Her second birthday is approaching in September so I've been looking at possible themes for her party. After attending my brothers engagement party, I'm all pumped up for our next party.

Last year we had a big party with about 150 guests. Yes..you really saw three digits.. we had 150 guests for her first birthday. It was a very big party hosted at our house. The theme last year was Milkaholic. Last year we made most of the food and it was a bad choice in my opinion. Cost for making food was pretty high and we were so busy all day. This year we plan to hire a catering company. I don't want to deal with any food. I rather sit back and enjoy. I just want to work on the decorations and fun stuff.

Here are some pictures from her Milkaholic theme last year. It was basically black and white (cow) decorations while our Emily was in a blue tiffany outfit. 

Party favors for the kids. 

Table full of gifts from friends and family.

There were more decorations but I didn't have time to take pictures. This year the theme will be owls. I saw a really cute owl theme birthday party online a long time ago and knew that I wanted an owl theme for her party this year. Lucky for us this year, my brother just got engaged so we will be able to use a lot of their supplies for free.  I love free decorations. 

Here's a teaser of what I've been doing lately. All house projects have been on hold because of her upcoming party. Here's a brief summary/list of what I've been doing. 

Cute invitations sent via email and Facebook. I printed a few out just for memory and taking pictures. 

note: address and phone number has been edited for privacy. 

Isn't the owl so adorable? 

Of course we had to buy an owl piñata. 

I've been on the look out for affordable chairs. I scored 50 black/gray chairs from craigslist for $50. Yep.. thats $1 each. It was from a local church in Ontario so they are in pretty good condition, not perfect but good enough for hosting parties. I'm proud because they were only $1 each. Renting would cost $1 each.  We already have table and table linens from my brothers engagement party.

I've done quite a few other things such as her custom birthday owl banner that spans 15 feet across our large mantle, water bottle labels, stocking up on all necessary supplies in bulk from costco, and a few other decorations. Once I'm done with her party I will try my best to do a cost breakdown and tutorial of some of the decorations I've been working on.

And lastly, we're also happy to announce that I'm expecting another little bean in my belly.  :) Since I'm expecting, I won't be doing to many house projects. I'll be decorating by purchasing but probably not DIY.