A Little Ladybug

I just put this one in the mail today! Little Emma is turning 2 and is having a ladybug themed party in pink, red, and black. Here is how the banner turned out:

As a little red dot was laying on the floor, I couldn't help making some little ladybugs to embellish it a bit:

Earlier today, I was emailing with Bridgett from b|e creative stationery, who I worked with on this airplane project earlier this summer because I am doing that same airplane theme for another customer. I thought she should make those adorable invitations that were the inspiration for the airplane banner the last time. As I was glancing through her shop and found these favor tags:


After talking to her I'm pretty sure they're for the same little Emma, though we haven't confirmed that with Emma's mom yet. But pretty cute, don't you think?! Bridgett asked if I have favor tags in my shop (and I do) or if I wanted to collaborate with her for future projects. Honestly I LOVE that there are so many awesome sellers out there with fab products...even if they make the same kinds of things as I do, so I'm going to give b|e another plug. Today (8.29.08), in honor of Bridgett turning 29 on the 29th, she's having a huge sale:

Just click on "sale" and it will take you to her shop.

Have a good holiday weekend...I probably won't post again until Monday night!

A Tea-Lightful Baby Shower

Here is another of the three baby showers I worked on last week. Just like the last one, this client also wanted something that was not the traditional light pinks and baby blues. She is throwing her sister-in-law a tea party of sorts and wanted deeper tones with a vintage feel but still somewhat gender neutral.

Here are the invitations from tiny*prints that she wanted me to sort of match to:

She also decided to do a bit of a play on words with the tea theme. This is how the banner turned out:After all our conversations, I also ended up buying her coordinating paper from her banner to wrap boxes with tea spoons in as favors so that it would all coordinate...great idea!

Stay tuned for one more baby shower this week...and a bunch of other new themes for birthdays as well!

What Little Boys Are Made Of...

Snips and snails and puppy dog tails, right? My husband keeps asking me what "snips" are and I have no answer for him, so if anyone knows, please leave a comment!

This is an adorable theme for any little boy. Its the biggest project I've worked on to date, and once you see the pictures of the location you'll know why! This client is hosting her little boy's party at her parents' house. They've held many of their 8 children's weddings in their backyard, too! Yes, 8 children...I told Eric I am definitely NOT CRAZY for wanting one more. So even with just family, little Carson is going to have a huge bash!

Here is a few pics of the location:

































And these are the style of invitations from tiny*prints that Mom Amanda sent me to start with:
From there, I created 2 banners (one to hang on the entrance to the pool area and one to hang over where the table will be), 13 centerpieces, 35 favor tags, 2 dozen cupcake toppers, and 15 party hats in Carson's colors: robin's egg blue, brown, and white.

Here are the highlights of those items:



















































Amanda was SO PATIENT...I was hoping to have this all done before I went on vacation early in the month, but I didn't send it to her until a week after I got back! The party's this weekend, so I'm hoping all arrived to her mom's house in one piece.

Happy Birthday, Carson! Can't wait to see pictures!

Little Man Marco

I have been working on three baby showers in the past week, which has been so fun. This one was for one of my sister's friends (last name Marco) who just found out she is having a little boy. The parents, Gina and Tim had picked out this cute bedding ensemble from Land of Nod and her friends were planning on giving it to her for her shower:
So my sister thought the banner should match the quilt, too, so after the shower they could hang it in the room until the baby was born. Here is Gina at her shower:

The girls had all gone to Milwaukee to stay with Gina for the weekend to attend the shower. After the shower they were all hanging out at Gina's house with nothing to do and decided to paint the baby's room for Gina and Tim (lucky man, that Tim is!). Here's how the banner looks with the quilt and the new paint color (and Gina's matching plaid shorts!):






























I had to make the door sign to match the room, too. The colors had all turned out so perfect with the quilt, we just couldn't resist! I love that though it was a baby shower, we didn't use the normal baby blues and greens. When the baby is born Gina can also take the "due" off the banner and change the date to the baby's birthday so she can leave it up if she'd like.

Little Man Marco will come home with his great parents to a great looking room. That's one lucky kiddo!

Polka Dots and Free Stuff!

I don't know if you've noticed the little button at the top of my sidebar, but this week is the 6 month "blogiversary" of On the Dot Creations...The Blog. In celebration of this event Julie is hosting giveaways of over $650 worth of polka dotted merchandise. I has been going on all week, but its not too late to get in on the action!

This afternoon, some of the products from my POLKADOT COLLECTION will be featured. The winner will receive a package of 10 invitations, 10 thank you notes, 6 cupcake toppers, and coordinating confetti.

Julie has had 6 or 7 giveaways per day. All you have to do is browse the Etsy shop where the featured giveaway item is from and leave a comment on Julie's blog telling her your favorite item in that shop. The deadline for entries for Monday's giveaways is tonight at midnight, so there's still time! Just click on the Polka dot givaways image in this post to get a list of all the giveaways and their entry ending times.

So good luck and go win something!

I mean it....

What are you still reading this for? Go now! : )

A Bridal Bouquet for Tracie

We threw a bridal shower for Tracie, my best friend from high school, this past weekend.  When we were younger, Tracie made me promise that if she turned 30 and was still unmarried that I would throw her an "I'm Not a Bride Yet" shower.  She said it wasn't fair that just because she couldn't find a man didn't mean that she shouldn't have nice dishes! : )  Well, today I am officially 6 months shy of my 30th, and Tracie is 9 months shy of hers, so I was very glad to be throwing her an actual bridal shower instead of the other kind!

Here are a few pics from the shower:  

Did anyone notice the date on the banner?  In true Tracie and Ryan fashion, they secretly eloped in July after only being engaged only a month.  They are high school sweethearts reunited (I should post a prom pic of Tracie, Ryan, my husband, and myself from 1997, but I don't wish to embarrass myself that much!), so we knew their engagement would be short, just not that short!  

They are going to have a reception here in September and are using the colors green, yellow, and pink, so I tried to stick to those colors as much as possible.  Here are a couple of their wedding pics that I used for decoration inspiration, too:

Congrats, Tracie and Ryan!

Batter up!

My nephew Jackson can really get around quickly. If he becomes a baseball player (his daddy would say when he becomes a baseball player!) he'll really have "wheels" to run those bases. This year for his 2nd birthday, they decided to have a baseball themed party.

Rachel and Brad had Jack's pictures taken in the shirt he was going to wear at the party (yes, of course she bought it on Etsy!). So I came up with some clever wording for their photographer to use for her invitations playing with the whole baseball theme. Katharine did such a good job I have to show you how it turned out:

Isn't he cute? Man I love that kid.

We were hosting the party here at Wrigley's Field...(aka our backyard...named after our yellow lab, Wrigley) and asked everyone to wear baseball attire. I found blue, black, and red vintage baseball papers for all his partyware and used a font called "allstar" that matched his shirt perfectly, too. Usually I show you pictures of the stuff hanging on my "workshop" wall or sitting on my ledge...but this one I can actually show you getting used! Its really fun to make things that I can see in action at the party.

Here is Jacks with his cake and his cousins (3 of 4 of those are my little baserunners!)

Here Beckett and I waiting for the cake to be cut...yes this 10 month old put down a whole piece himself!

And some more of the party decor:

This one is of me and my sisters...I had to include it because this weekend we all went with my sister Kara (far right) to chop her hair off to her shoulders. It has been long like this since she was in 8th grade. Look how long it was, Kip! Click here if you want to see a pic of her new cute 'do.

It was a wonderfully fun party and all went well...Jacks definitely needed a nap by the time it was over. To thank everyone, Rachel had these thank yous made by Sara of Less Ordinary Designs.

Happy Golden Birthday, JP! Love you!

Big Top Birthday

I love, love, love how this one turned out! This mom was looking for bold brights in a circus animals theme. She sent me the pics she had downloaded from istock to make her invites with, and I said why not use them for her birthdayware, too! Then we found a circus font that we both liked and got to work on the banner, hats, and crown:









I already have a request for this paper without the animals or circus theme, which would be cute, too!

Pretty in Pink (and Brown)!

These two ladies both wanted pink and brown (some of my favs!) for their daughters turning one. I had already started little Eliza's banner when Jozlyn's mom requested pretty much the same thing. Their banners are alike (they both even picked my favorite font!), but both customers needed a bit different styles for coordinating partyware. Here are their banners:



Eliza's party is going to be cupcake themed, but her mom wanted to be able to use the banner again in coming years, so we stuck to just pink and brown in the banner, but then I hunted out the perfect cupcake to put on her cupcake toppers, hats, and thank yous. Here they are:







For Jozlyn's cupcake toppers, I used pink paper instead of white for the actual printing and included her middle name:



It all looks good enough to eat! Happy Birthday, girls.

Cupcakes, Cupcakes, Cupcakes!

Over the past month I have done a bunch of custom cupcake and cake toppers. Some of them have been just a spin on my originals and some have been a total departure from my norm.

This client already had a banner and wanted a cupcake and cake topper for her niece Chloe's 1st birthday in orange, pink, and yellow. She creatively used the cake topper in cupcakes, too!





This client needed something pink and green for little Amelia's 1st birthday:





Through Etsy's Alchemy process I made these cupcake toppers for Seth and Nicole's wedding. Their whole wedding is vintage carnival themed in red (the color of her dress), turqoise, and cream. She sent me their wedding website to get a feel of what they were going for...it is quite elaborate...you should really check it out! She had already purchased some circus "inchies" from another etsy seller and wanted me to turn them into cupcake toppers. Here they are:





Then, when I was almost finished with them, Nicole wanted me to somehow cover the wrapper of the cupcake to make them a bit more finished looking...and after remembering some 9th grade geometry and relearning to use a compass, I figured out just the right angles and made these cupcake wrappers:



And once we had that done, she decided to buy some more inchies and have the appetizer picks match, too! I can't wait to see her wedding pictures.





And on a side note...all of these cupcake toppers were so fun to work on...my 2 1/2 year old daughter has been having some sleep issues as of late and sneaks downstairs after her brothers are sleeping to "help Mom make 'toppers' ". How can I make her go to bed when she says, "You makin' toppers again, Mom? I wanna make toppers, too!" My poor middle child is seeking a little attention and I'm happy to indulge her a bit...but rest assured that her "helping" is sitting in the chair next to me and holding the roll of adhesive!