Oh man, I have a FOUR year old!! I can’t believe how quickly time has passed, I feel so torn. On one hand I miss her when she was little and want to keep her small forever but on the other hand, every day I’m amazed at the things she’s learning and I’m so excited to see her grow! Anyways…when I first asked her what she wanted for the theme she promptly replied, “Coraline” it’s one of her favorite movies so I shouldn’t have been surprised. I went back and forth on if I could use that theme and make it not so creepy until she came home and said she had asked one of her classmates if he wanted button eyes and he started to cry. That decided it and the Coraline theme was no more. Gnomes were MUCH happier and little kid friendly, haha. I didn’t want the traditional blue and red colors so when I found a section of brightly colored Gnomes at Hobby Lobby I snatched them all up and used their colors as my palette. Kim from BarefootStudiosOK created all my wonderful paper printables, including this darling invitation! She was so great to work with and took all my wants and made them into reality. Check out the rest of the party below!
I’m lucky that Brielle was born in June because it opens up so many locals to have her parties since it’s such beautiful weather. I picked a small local park that was enclosed with huge shade trees and a shallow lazy stream snaking through, it really helped add to the woodland feel. They had a covered pavilion with lots of picnic tables as well with was great with me since it saved me money on renting tables and chairs, plus my brothers HATE setting them all up and tearing them all down afterwards so this was a great set up with them too 😉 I had 3 sections, adult tables on either side of the kid tables so parents could be close by but still let them feel like big kids with their very own table
This was the place setting for everyone. The only difference was the adults got plain big cups and the kids got these freaking CUTE toadstool cups! They also did double duty as favors
Brielle with some of her Gnomies. Seriously, those Gnome hats were the highlight. Both for the kids and for the adults, none of us could help but smile seeing all these tiny people milling about in Gnome hats
One of the kid table centerpieces
I was so thrilled to find all my place setting pieces in the colors I wanted! All the place cards were made by Kim
The other kid table centerpiece
My mom and I made the hats. We made 24 of them in about an hour (cutting out the template, sewing, and attaching the decoration). The girls got various colored flowers
And the boys got leaves and ladybugs
One section of the adult tables, they all looked like this with different centerpieces and colored runners
One section of adult table centerpieces. Big shout out to my sweet friend Laura…she mailed me all these tiny colored Gnomes specifically for this party! I’ve met the BEST women through this blog of mine! She’d used them in her St Patrick mantel decor this year, go check out her IG account to see it and the rest of her creativity!
The other section’s centerpieces
Drink station details
Drink station, the banner was also made by Kim
I didn’t get a picture of the food table but we ordered a few 6 ft sub sandwiches from Wal-Mart that everyone could customize their own sandwich with the toppings. We also had multiple salads, chips and bowls of fresh berries. This was the only food picture I got before the whole table was ravaged
The dessert table! I went super simple this year with just cupcakes and brownies
My mom’s friend made this incredible cake! Every single item on here is edible, I’m seriously in awe of people that have baking talents like this!
A close up, I’m dying over this little Gnome fishing! It’s kinda washed out but check out the darling baby Gnome peeking out from flower on top…eeee! All the kids could barely keep their hands off it and after we sung Happy Birthday and candles were blown out they picked this cake clean so you know it was pretty amazing
I got the cupcakes from Wal-Mart, they were much better than I was expecting, decoration wise! They were exactly how I described them and they tasted great too! The toppers are also from Kim
My mother in law makes my favorite brownies and I’m always looking for reasons to have her make them so this was a win win situation
Our planned activity was a Gnome hunt! They all had to find a package of Fruit Snack berries, a colored feather, painted blue rock, and finally a mini Gnome…all for the rest of their favors. They all had such a blast searching and the adults had fun hiding everything. Every single 4 and 5 yr old now truly believes that this park is a magical park where Gnomes hid things for kids to find. I LOVE this age so so much and I can’t wait to experience 4 with this gorgeous, feisty, and inquisitive little girl!
Cups, napkins, straws, toadstool cups: Oriental Trading
Green toadstools, mini toadstools, moss animals, glass birds: At Home
Large Gnomes: Target
Smaller Gnomes, flowers, moss runners: Hobby Lobby
Serving bowls, wood tiers, adult cups, utensils, favor bags: Zurchers
Plates: Party City
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