Charlotte's Birthday Fete- The Results

We did it. We turned out a beautiful second birthday party for my angelface. To refresh you, it was a hot air balloon theme with a rainbow color scheme. I used my Cricut to make the decorations on the bar.

The weather ended up perfect, (dispite earlier unpleasant weather reports), the food was enjoyed, and the kids had a blast.

The balloon banner was more difficult than I had anticipated...I used this to make it-

The fact that I purchased a helium tank without actually needing one to make the banner was slightly annoying, and some of the balloons that came free with the tank ended up being differently colored than they looked before inflation...next time I make a banner, my lungs can do the job of filling the balloons and I'll choose the balloon colors myself. I used about 40 balloons to make this one. So my perfectly colored rainbow balloon banner (ya know, ROYGBIV) wasn't the color scheme I had pictured, but it was still pretty cute. (My adorable grandparents and Dad's head also happen to be included in the pic) .

A big hit were the veggie cups- instead of arranging veggies on a tray with dip to spoon onto your plate, I placed an array of veggies in a cup, with homemade ranch dressing in the bottom of each cup. I thought it made for a much easier way of serving, and it seemed unanimous with the guests. 

 The mini-hot air balloons contained

 baskets of multi-grain pretzel nuggets and sweet & spicy pecans from Trader Joe's.

Bought the rainbow-colored hanging lanterns at Party City.

Inside, I made rainbow streamer banners to accent the theme.

                                      

The Menu (excuse the few typos, I re-printed it before the party but forgot to re-take a pic) 

Rainbow swirl lollipop favors for the kiddos--

bought the suckers from Oriental Trading & made the stickers on Microsoft Publisher.

Mommy and her birthday munchkin