Purple Princess Party

Saturday was Grace Elizabeth's 3rd birthday party. It still feels like yesterday our neighbors were all gathered in our living room celebrating her first birthday! That day she took her first steps and her independence has grown like a giant snowball rolling down hill and picking up speed ever since! Now she's three {or she will be tomorrow} and going off to preschool in August! Time flies does not even begin to describe what has happened to the last 1,094 days!

My non-girly girl has recently decided that dressing up as a princess with tiaras, shoes and tulle covered dresses is fun. She was given free reign to decide what she wanted to do to celebrate her birthday and her choice was a princess party with a purple dress, purple cupcakes and purple decorations. This new found love of purple and princesses was a bit of a surprise to me, but I was happy to oblige.

Grace made up her guest list and invited all of her neighborhood pals. Sadly three of her friends could not make it. Her buddy Katie and her sister Abby, who are leaving us and moving back to Texas, were sick. It was heartbreaking to see them at the door with Grace's gift and not be able to stay for the party. Katie loves to play dress up! Although she is a year older than Grace, almost to the day, she has been a great playmate since we moved here almost three years ago! We are really going to miss them! Thankfully we had a chance last week to help celebrate Katie's birthday... I know we are going to feel the big gap left in our neighborhood family long after Katie and her family leave.

Taylor who came decked out in princess outfit, tiara and shoes {So stinking cute! It was perfect Rachael!} had to come without her brothers. Her middle brother was home sick with ear infections and we missed having him here. His absence left Vincent, once again, the only boy at the party! You know Rylan was there.... and thanks to Auntie Kelli giving Grace two princess outfits, the two amigos were decked out in fairy princess atire for the remainder of the evening.  I am sure it is Princess Ry who inspired Grace's new found love of all things princess!

I have to admit, I had some fun decorating for Grace's party Friday night. We had ordered some princess themed ceiling decorations for the party but beyond that I had no clue. I bought a bunch of pink and lavender spools of tulle from Michaels and just started playing around. First was the kitchen chandelier. It’s already curly and fairy tale looking to begin with, but it just looked like it should be draped in tulle. When that was done it was still lacking something. So I started making pink tulle peonies. Then I tied lavender ribbon from the ends of each piece of the tulle hanging from the light and attached the peonies at different levels. I might have started to get a little too into it at this point.

Next I draped lavender tulle from the banister and pinned it up with large pink tulle peonies. Loving it! --- Martha Stuart ain’t got nothing on me! {now channeling Denzel}--- Okay, maybe she does, but I was feeling good! It continued with lavender table cloths on the table and on the island. Draped with lime green tulle and pinned with small pink tulle peonies. More lavender and pink on the patio and a tulle draped front door. Pink and lavender balloons everywhere - Pink, purple and teal marabou tiaras for the girls, gold crowns for the boys… It was a royal affair!

My baby is three...
My Princess is three!
Happy *almost* birthday Grace Elizabeth!