Adelyn’s 1st Birthday

The baby daughter of a photographer friend of mine turned one, and they gave me the privilege of working on her birthday party invitations. This simple 5×7 card incorporated a photo of Adelyn wearing a bright pink tutu, sitting next to a chalkboard with the number one drawn on it (she’s very advanced for her age…). We added a hot pink metallic envelope to make it extra special.

gender reveal party

Gender Reveal Party

Heather and Matt got married at the Dayton Art Institute in November 2010 and are expecting their first bundle of joy. They decided to find out the sex of the baby at a “Gender Reveal Party” that included all of their closest friends and family members. The Gender Reveal is a new trend that just recently started making headlines across the country as couples started coming up with unique ways to find out the sex of their baby at a celebration with family and friends. Heather scheduled their Gender Reveal Party for the day after her 20-week ultrasound…she and Matt shielded their eyes at the appointment and had the ultrasound technician put the determining photo into a sealed envelope, which was then delivered to the bakery that was responsible for creating the shower cake. The bakery was instructed to use pink filling for a girl and blue for a boy, and to carefully frost the cake to conceal its contents so it wouldn’t ruin the surprise before the big moment. Heather cut into the cake at the shower to reveal……blueberries! They’re expecting a little boy in early 2013, and couldn’t be more thrilled. Congrats to the parents-to-be! (To see Heather and Matt’s beautiful winter wedding invitation, click here.)

 

Ginger’s Baby Shower

There are two things I love most about this baby shower invitation: the cool pink and brown polka dot ribbon from Midori, and the adorable font. Those two elements, combined with a metallic pink bottom layer and white micah printed invitation piece make this a simple yet fun invitation, perfect for a baby shower announcing the upcoming arrival of a sweet baby girl.

Baby Gavin

Welcome to the world, Baby Gavin! What a sweet surprise to have one of my brides from a few years ago wander into the store…8 months pregnant! A few weeks later, she and her husband welcomed a beautiful baby boy. For his birth announcement we decided to go with something special- a brown textured folded card with blue satin ribbon that showcased his gorgeous pictures on the right and gave the stats on the left. Absolutely perfect, just like him.

 

Mary Colleen Birth Announcement

To announce Mary’s post-Valentine’s Day arrival her parents wanted to include a 4×6 photo with the announcement so family and friends could have a momento to keep, so we chose a portable pocket that was large enough to accommodate a full-size photo mounted onto a pink and white paisley card. The alabaster satin ribbon pull tab at the top of the photo card serves as a cute way to pull the photo out of the pocket and adds a little bit of shine at the same time. Mary’s stats from her arrival day are printed in a pale pink ink on the white linen card that we adhered to the front of the pocket, and finishing off the ensemble is a lower case “m” graphic which makes this announcement distinctly hers and gives it a little modern flair.

Land and Sea birthday

Mason and Ryan are best friends with birthdays four days apart, and they both happen to love the same two things: dinosaurs and sharks. To compromise, we decided a “Land and Sea” theme would be fun, and created an invitation with a reptile texture wrap, and an accent layer in ice blue that had a wrinkled texture (that I was convinced represented shark skin). The party was held at the Boonshoft Museum of Discovery, and their cake was done by Dorothy Lane Market to match the shark and dinosaur theme and was absolutely INCREDIBLE. We cringed when we finally cut into it, but made sure to take plenty of pictures beforehand to capture it’s awesomeness.

Grace’s First Communion

Grace is one of three lovely sisters for whom I’ve had the pleasure of creating some pretty special announcements and invitations, ranging from birth announcements to First Communion invitations. We took a more traditional feminine approach with this particular invitation, using the palest of pinks and ivory to create a softer feel, and paired it against a chocolate brown backing to coordinate with the mocha ink, adding a delicate, simple cross at the top. This invitation would also make a lovely baptism announcement.

 

Andrew’s 1st Birthday

I love this hippo. This was the very first thing I ever attempted to draw in Illustrator and I can’t tell you how proud I am of the way he turned out (not bad for being self-taught in CS!) Andrew’s mom came to us looking for a cute hippo invitation and she had found a few online that she liked but like most of our customers, she was nervous about ordering online (understandably so…you just never know what you’re going to get). None of our invitation lines carried a hippo invite, and since I’m one of those people who doesn’t understand the phrase, “Sorry, we can’t do that,” I sat down and decided to draw it myself – and he came out pretty darn cute, if I do say so. 🙂

Truman’s Puppy Party

Truman is the adorable son of one of my favorite former employees, and I have to say that Molly throws the best kids’ birthday parties I have ever seen. She spares no detail, and makes everything come together like something out of a magazine (or Pinterest). Truman’s second birthday was a puppy party, so we wanted to use plenty of shades of brown, but what makes this invitation so distinct are the paw-print ribbon, the 3-dimensional puppy embellishment and the playful font.

Kathryn’s 1st Birthday

Sweet things come in small packages, and this lovely lollipop of an invitation was the perfect way to invite close family and friends to Kathryn’s first birthday party. Bubblegum pink and lime green were cheerful colors to use for a first birthday and the square size made it a little bit more unique. We added glitter on top of the lollipop swirls and used a whimsical curly font to make it as girly as possible.

 

Bode Jackson

This little guy has kept me company on the shop’s “wall of fame” ever since he arrived in November 2007- it’s hard to believe he’s turning five this year! This announcement includes a 3.5×5 z-card with three panels, metallic white printed cards, and a satin ribbon that ties it all together. On the first panel we used sweet verbiage that Bode’s dad came up with; the center panel features his photo (by Mark Garber) and the third panel lists his birthdate, weight and length. The bottom layer z-card is a pale blue polka dot stock, with three white micah metallic cards layered on top and a 5/8″ ribbon from Midori with “le bebe” written in a repeating pattern.

 

Erin Elizabeth

Erin was welcomed into the world by her big sister, Lena whose birth announcements I did while I was still at Ink back in 2004. We kept a similar floral style, using Anna Griffin patterned paper, this time in a textured blush pink. The ribbon is Midori’s double-faced satin. These two little girls have been a joy to watch grow up over the last several years through various birthday party invitations, including a cowgirl-themed party we did a few years ago.

 

Ryan’s 1st Birthday

This was a very special invitation because it was for my son’s first birthday party. Since Ryan is such a little monkey, and always getting into everything, I decided a Safari theme would be fun to work with. I love the bright orange paired with the chartreuse and butter yellow- it was exactly the feel I was hoping to accomplish. To carry out the theme, I did matching photo cards that I hung on ribbon from the market umbrella on the patio – one for each month of his first year, with a photo and milestones from that month printed on them. It was a cute way to share the details of his first year with friends and family. I also did tent cards for the food table that were labeled with names such as “Tiger Tails” (i.e. cheese sticks) and had the same stick-on embellishments that were featured on the invitations. The weather even made it feel like we were in the middle of the Serengeti- it was over 80 degrees in October!

 

Safari Birthday Table Tents

I went overboard on Ryan’s first birthday, and I’ll be the first to admit it. I thought it would be fun to have table cards for the food and make them coordinate with the party invitations. I kept with the color scheme of orange, yellow and green, and had enough animal embellishments leftover to adorn the table tents. We served everything family style, from mini burgers (“Slammin’ Safari Sandwiches”) to hot wings (“Ragin’ Rhino Wings”).