Last year for my birthday I made myself a Barbie doll cake. The Barbie Movie was all the rage last summer and what can I say, I'm a Barbie girl. This year we ordered a cake from a family run bakery that I frequent. But I wanted to do something for me. This summer has been all about Hazel. Our vacation to the Cape included her friends. Then she decided to apply to an arts school for theater. After several weeks of doing the application, then interview and audition, she got in. July was a busy month with a lot of focus on Hazel. Now we are in the process of figuring out financing and gathering everything she will need for dorm life. I'm sending my baby away, but I know she is ready and so am I. Therefore, I wanted to do something for me around my birthday and I haven't had much time with friends, so I thought a girls' night at home was perfect. Since pink is my favorite color, I decided to do a pink themed party. I went to Greetings Island and made an invitation. (I shared about Greetings Island here.) I downloaded the invitation and texted it to my friends. I used the Inside Flower template, and it is a free one!!
The weather ended up being beautiful after several days of rain, so we decided to hang out outside. I decorated the patio using pink paper lanterns leftover from Hazel's birthday parties. Unfortunately, none of the lights still worked for inside them.
I also pulled out the leftover pink heart glasses I got for us last year for The Barbie Movie. I put out some gem stickers too so we could decorate them.
I wore by Barbie earrings too!! I was all out Barbie that night. Hazel put together a playlist for us for our background music. I also bought raspberry lemonade, white zinfandel, sparkling pink lemonade, sparkling strawberry drink, and some sparkling waters in pink or red cans and bottles. I also found pink plastic cups at Dollar Tree and had some pink beverage napkins in my party cabinet.
I didn't have a pink umbrella tablecloth but used one with red on it and put out pink placemats. I made some labels for the types of food as well. I also had some pink plates and napkins for the food.
I bought a pink bowl and a pink platter at Dollar Tree as well. Then I used white or clear for other foods. For food we had (links take you to recipes):
- watermelon (I didn't take a photo of it)
- strawberry cookies (I didn't use any food coloring)
- lemon raspberry cookies (I mixed a little bit more to get more pink than yellow)
- raspberry meringues
- salsa dip with chips and veggies
- cucumber sandwiches and cracker sandwiches
- assorted candy and pretzels
I also searched for a pink dip. Almost everything I found was a beet-based dip and I don't like beets. Then I remembered the taco dip I used to make for every party. It uses taco mix, salsa, cream cheese and pureed red peppers. It was usually orange, but I thought this was because of the taco mix. So, I mixed a softened container of (hard) cream cheese with about a cup or so of salsa. It wasn't quite the color I wanted so I added some neon pink food coloring. I was quite happy with how it came out. It was delicious as well!
I couldn't find any red tortilla chips, so I used regular ones and put red and purple carrots (I went to a local farm and was able to pick just a few of each color), red peppers, and cucumbers out with the dip. I put the vegetables in pink paper cups bought at Dollar Tree.
I knew I had a vegetarian friend coming so I stayed away from meat things. I did consider making ham rolls but decided against it. I decided to do some small finger sandwiches. I decided cucumber sandwiches with strawberry cream cheese would be fun. I used a flower cookie cutter on white bread and spread the cream cheese all over it. Then I topped it with a slice of cucumber.
I also found a log of blueberry goat cheese. If it was a little closer to fall, I would have loved a cranberry one so it would be red, but the blueberry was purplish. I spread some on pita crackers and topped them with a piece of strawberry.
Then on the circle center of my daybed I had a tray of pink candy including some strawberry and raspberry pretzels.
