Stay Wild Moon Child - Finley's First Birthday

Finley's first birthday party was easily one of the best day's of my life. We waited so long to be able to celebrate a baby's birthday and the privilege it is to do so will never be lost on us.

In full disclosure, before I was a mama I was a creator. As a teacher, I created resources like escape rooms (check out my TPT store HERE) and loved nothing more than a good theme to plan content around. Motherhood is absolutely everything to me, but I also want to get back that side of myself again. I will be linking my outfit and party supplies. I do have a liketoknow.it account also where I will be linking outfits and other things, which I'll include at the end of this blog post. I plan to begin sharing more home decor, fashion, and of course, motherhood posts. I never want to "profit" off of Finn or want it to come across as that, but this blog space has become an outlet for me and in everything I do, Finn will be apart of because he has changed me. I hope you stick around to see what this blog space becomes. I will continue to share our grief journey, as that will be lifelong, but I'm living again, and excited for our future.

Ok, back to the birthday girl! There was so much anxiety leading up to her birthday party. For Finn I began crafting months prior and days before his aneurysm ruptured I sent out his party invites. While we were in the hospital, family and friends received their invitations for a party that would never be. I made matching family shirts for us, koozies for all the guests, sport button clips (Rookie of the Year theme) with Finn's picture, various banners, a backdrop, a highchair banner, and more. For Finley, I crafted nothing until the week of. I was too scared. Scared what it would mean to get my hopes up. Scared to be excited. One of the hardest parts was sending out invitations. The timing of sending Finn's and when they were received made it difficult to send out Finley's. AND I guess Finn knew this because no one received Finley's invites. How wild is that? I waited weeks and not a single person received them, until days before the party or after, most are still lost in the mail, I assume. I haven't figured out the deeper meaning of this, but I don't believe in coincidences.

As most of you know, I called Finn my sunshine. And when Finley was still in my belly, I coined her my moon, hopeful that like a moon, she'd provide light in the darkness, so that's how her Stay Wild, Moon Child theme came to be.

This bow and the one in the invitation pictures are both Stevie Js - click here to go to the website.

Once Finley's birthday party day arrived, I felt this huge weight off my shoulders. She's here, and she's staying. Finley was in the best mood and hammed it up. I was so worried she'd be scared of everyone and cry during cake smash, but she is full of surprises, or maybe she could feel our joy and was happy too. :)

The round backdrop stand was an investment, but I used it for a baby shower prior and figured I could use it for many birthdays to come. All the balloons are from Amazon - you can customize any saying - so neat! If you decide to do a balloon arch of any kind, definitely purchase an air machine - makes it so quick!

I've included the links for the air machine and custom balloon words below:

I've had a few people ask about my outfit for the party - it was as comfortable as it is cute. It appears this shop isn't on Liketoknow.it - so here's the direct link! (5ft, 120lbs - small in bottoms - medium in top)

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PANTS

For her monthly photos I wanted to display them differently than a banner and found these cute rose gold picture stands on Amazon! Austin says she didn't get cute until around month 4. Mean, Dada! Here's a look at her monthly photos. :)

Next blog post might have to be Finley's Fashion because I'm just sayin'! But most of her cute finds either come from Auntie Jess or BST groups on Facebook. I'll link her Amazon bows because I spent too much money on bows when I was pregnant, only to end up using the Amazon ones that come out to $.50/each 95% of the time.

And the most delicious cake and cookies came from Billy Jeans - check her out HERE.

And of course, we couldn't have a birthday party for Finley without celebrating her Dada too! His 32 cake was from Fierro's Sweets in Hillsboro and was a banana pudding cake.

Thank ya'll all for sticking around for our journey. This is a tough month with Finn's angelversary approaching, and I'll have more to share on that later.

If you‘d like to follow my LIKEtoKNOW.it, my name is Taylorpope on there. :)

Much Love,

Finn's Mama