This has been the week from hell. Truly. Last Sunday, my MiL fell at her house and broke her arm. Her “friend” who was living with her rent-free for 7 months bailed and it got ugly. DW had to referee and help this “friend” pack her crap to get her out of there quickly. Both boys and I have been sick forever. We were supposed to go to Disney.land Thursday and Friday, but that didn’t happen. Instead, I was home alone and sick with two sick boys all day (with no car) while DW was helping her mom. They do not get along well, so that was not at all pleasant for DW. Today we were supposed to go hang with a friend and her son and have beers, but I’m feeling worse today and the MM had a rough night so only DW and Monkey went. See? Told you it was a week of suck.
In all of this, however, I’ve come up with the perfect theme for baby MM’s first birthday (4/29/14) – we’re having a vintage toy party! (Amanda, I blame you for this WAY AHEAD planning 🙂 I was not even thinking about baby’s first birthday until you posted that you had started planning Boo’s!)
Long-time readers may know that we are all about vintage themes. First, there was our vintage cowboy themed baby shower:
Then Monkey’s Winter ONEderland party, which had a vintage feel:
And last year, we had a vintage cowboy/train party for Monkey’s third birthday:
Now I’m pinning like a mad woman and having so much fun! This theme is perfect for us as we already have tons of vintage style toys and stuffed animals. Below is just a fraction of what we have (why yes, I was extremely bored being cooped up for so many days and gathered toys and took pictures of some ideas for the party):
We also have the Fisher.Price piano and phone and lots of tin toys (robots, planes, etc.).
Also have a sock monkey and an adorable little goose stuffy that would work well.
We also have:
- Old school building sets (tinker.toys, baby blocks, and Lincoln.Logs): Thinking of spelling out the MM’s name with the baby blocks and using tinker.toys to hold cards that have the different food items on them with some vintage clip art.
- Wooden train set: This could be cute for centerpiece(s). Milk bottle with sunflowers and circular train track around the base.
- Little.Golden.Books (thinking of buying these as party favors, too): Check out the Little.Golden.Books party stuff!
- Wooden puzzles: Have ABCs, 123s, animals
- Grocery cart with wooden pots, pans, and food
The possibilities are ENDLESS!
Decor can also double as entertainment (kids can play with the toys)! We are planning on having this at our local park and we’ll bring Monkey’s Radio.Flyer wagon (add cute bunting and wagon balloon and put gifts in it!), tricycle, and scooter for cuteness and play, too. I’m having way too much fun fantasizing about this party. It won’t be nearly as elaborate as what I have in my head, but it won’t take much effort or money to make it super cute and fun. I need to find someone who has a wooden highchair I can borrow to really put the finishing touch on it…
The only thing I’m trying to think of is if we do this as a morning party, what vintagey type food could we serve? I had initially thought Cracker.Jacks, animal crackers, that sort of thing, but is that nuts if we had a party at like 9 or 10AM? Thoughts?
two girls' path to parenthood 
Okay, I take responsibility for planting the seed of early planning, but woah you knocked it out of the park. I love, LOVE, this idea!!!! We have many vintage toys as well. Radio Flyer is big around here and I go almost silly for Fisher Price Little People sets. DW has a set of 1980 Sesame Street character die cast cars that she played with as a child, as well as a set of little kid animal themed dominoes her grandmother gave her from WAY BACK…like 1960s.
I would just go with whatever food you want and then do a vintage candy bar for dessert. I know LOTS of candy shops that have old school candy. But cracker jacks would be awesome mixed in with some old fashion cow tails, bit o honey, razzles, wax lips…and chix of sticks….Mmmmmmmm!!! I think there is a place online a friend of mine used to find vintage candy for her mom’s 60th birthday. They have candy for each decade from 1950s and up, I believe name is Candy Crate? I do not think that time matters, if I was attending a child’s party, no matter what time, I would expect kiddie foods. Just saying. Maybe a vintagey style brunch offering? Hope everyone gets to feeling better and sorry that DW has to deal with a sick family and a whiny (I am sure) mom 😦
Oh holy cuteness! New follower here, just popping in to say that I love, love the vintage toy idea, well the entire theme really! I’ve always told my wife that if we ever had a boy, I would want a cowboy themed baby shower so I may have to borrow some of your vintage cowboy party ideas down the road. 🙂 You’re now on my blogroll – looking forward to following!
Thank you and welcome 🙂