Mod Forest Party

We had Ben's birthday party last weekend and it was so much fun. I used a woodland forest theme, and started with these invitations. I was originally inspired by some woodland cookie cutters that I found at IKEA when Ben was only a few weeks old. Later in the year, I saw this post by Hostess with the Mostess and was so excited to plan.

Even though I started way ahead, I still felt like it was thrown together because I was gone for a two days leading up to it. Because of this, I felt rushed and didn't get much of a chance to take great photos, but I wanted to share just a few to serve as inspiration for you! You can see more photos here.

Find the invitation and matching printables here:  http://etsy.me/1br4tEE

• Custom water bottle labels

• I found this cute squirrel candle and his buddy, the hedgehog, at Pottery Barn. And because they were too cute to only use for the birthday party, they're now adorning my mantle. I set them up on stumps for a great table decoration. I had a stuffed owl that I did this with, also.

• The trees in the centerpieces were built by my handy husband (and were relatively inexpensive), and were surrounded by fake moss I bought on sale at Michael's. The frames are double sided and were $.99 from IKEA.

• I used a sheet of scrapbook paper under each plate as a place mat and used little forest creature foamies to wrap the silverware in craft paper. I also used round stickers on small snack cups filled trail mix.

• We served three kinds of soup and four kinds of deli meat and cheese . . . matching buffet cards were a cute way to help our guests know what they were taking. And the table cloth on the soup table was actually this duvet from IKEA.

• The cookies were made with the squirrel and hedgehog cookie cutters and were a little sad looking. But the bag toppers were great! We also offered individually wrapped cake pops. My plan was to stand them up in a styrafoam block, covered in moss, but I ran out of time! The "tablecloth" here was one of IKEA's $4.00 sheets. With those prices, I don't think I'll ever buy a real table cloth again!

• My husband made these cupcake stands out of basswood rounds (from Michaels) and stumps from a friends' house. My plan had been to halve mini-marshmallows to put white dots on the cupcakes to make them look like toadstools. My plan didn't work. Fortunately, Maria made the cupcakes so they still looked great and tasted AMAZING. If you've never had a cupcake by Maria, you're really missing out.

• The pennant banners were my usual fireplace decoration. I had a sign that said "Happy Birthday Bennett" that was meant to hang across the middle of the room . . . but I couldn't get it to stay up and I ran out of time.