Carnival Time!

Tiffany (with the cool bowling pin invitations for her husband's birthday last year) wanted to do a carnival-themed invitation for her son's first birthday, and wanted something unique. I came up with a few ideas, and this is what we went for:

The invitations were mailed in boxes nestled with rainbow kernel popcorn 

(the kernels were red, blue, yellow and lots of fun):

The invitation was wrapped with custom made tickets with the 

party date on each end and red & white striped baker's twine....

The invitation itself was printed on linen cardstock and mounted 

on red plexiglass sheets for a vintage meets modern feel:

The edges of the plexiglass were beveled to make them nice and smooth...

Tucked in between the invitation and the tickets were 

an RSVP postcard and an accommodations card

Here's the suite with some of the rainbow popcorn -- you can see some 

of the different colors on the kernels in this photo:

Each invitation was mailed in a white corrugated box filled with popcorn. 

Custom mailing labels hinted at what the inside held....

These had a ton of elements and were so much fun to work on. Tiffany has emailed me

 to tell me that her guests have emailing, calling, and facebooking her with how much

 they love the invitations and can't wait for the party. 

Airplane themed 2nd Birthday Invitation

My sweet boy started to obsess about airplanes a few months ago, right around 

when I started planning his second birthday. Here are the invitations 

that I came up with for him.... 

I was torn between doing a traditional flat 5x7 invitation, a boarding pass, 

and a passport. I decided to just go for it with an airplane ticket folder

 and a boarding pass-style invitation. 

The folder:

Close-up of the pocket of the folder -- 

the Dietrich Airways logo was carried through on all of the stationery:

I love the "2" that the plane makes in the background -- if you look closely, 

you'll see it in the middle of the invitation, too:

One of the many details -- pilot wings for all of the kids, plus ones for hubby and I!

I purchased foam gliders online as a craft for the kids -- everyone had an opportunity to use markers, stickers, or paint (for the older kids) to customize their own glider. Here's the one I made -- after they decorated their glider, they got the pair of wings made with their initial.

Close-up of the wings: