Polka Dotty Pool Party – {Food Table}

Today kicks off my series on a more in depth look into Baby P’s Polka Dotty Pool Party! **Warning – this is NOT a short post**
First I thought I would show you my slightly neurotic planning process. I love lists and drawings (well sketches).

Go ahead, I can wait while you finish laughing at me.

So yeah – it might be overkill but it is how my brain works and the sketches help convey my plans to any people I can get to help me (okay, to be honest, anyone I will ALLOW to help me).

Today I want to talk about the buffet/food table. The centerpiece of any at home party is the food so I wanted it to be a special table. I really wanted to hang a backdrop but time wasn’t on my side, and it wasn’t my house, so I didn’t want to get too crazy! I will go picture by picture to talk about the details!

 To start, I took the cupcake tree that I used for R’s Puppy Party and recovered it in the colors I was using for the party, Navy, Hot Pink & Lime Green. At first I had only trimmed the edges in ribbon, but that just wasn’t doing it for me, so I traced the pieces of the tower on to paper, cut out & used my tape gun to glue it down. The bottom layer was the hardest b/c it is 14×14 and we all know scrapbook paper is 12×12, so I had to piece it all together. I placed the cupcake tree on a stand Mr. Kinda Crafty made for me to give it some more height.

 You don’t really want all your food sitting out too long in the Florida heat – so I set out all the vessels first and added the food right before people were to arrive (thankfully everyone was late, because I wasn’t ready on time!)

 The white boxes weren’t my first choice for the swiss cake roll fruit kabobs, but after going to several stores I gave up and bought these planters from Ikea, painted them white myself and slapped on a little polka dotty ribbon. Matching ribbon on all your vessels really ties everything together, as if they were bought in a set. To hold the kabobs I cut Styrofoam to fit the planters and then covered the Styrofoam with coconut shreds that I dyed blue to look like water.

 I did something a little sneaky for the Fish & Chips bowl. I was tired of trying to store the handmade cake pedestals that I have a bad habit of making so I decided to make the pedestals reusable by not permanently attaching the plates or bowls to them. This way I can make 1 (or however many I need) base and then through the magic of velcro, I can change out the plates & bowls that I want to use!! Genius, right?!?

 This was the “lounge” area of the party. I made this cute centerpiece by taking the graphic from the invitation, importing it into Silhouette Studio, tracing the shape, and then used the Print & Cut feature to make 2 large flotation devices (one of which I flipped horizontally so they would match up perfectly when I glued them back to back). I glued the 2 cut outs onto an 8″ lollipop stick and stuck it into a pail I had prepped with Styrofoam & dyed coconut shreds!

 Here is a homemade cake stand I had made before I wised up to the Velcro method! I made this for St. Patty’s day, but it has become very useful for many events! And, let’s be honest, ANY plate looks immediately better with cookies from The Cookie Jar!!

 I so desperately love the party photos where everyone lines up the soda bottles in a neat row but let’s be honest – it is HOT in Florida and no one wants to drink warm sugary soda. So I displayed the different sodas available next to the straws but kept the rest in the cooler with the bottled water.

 I called up Publix to order my cupcakes and smash cake. I told her I wanted all white frosting on my cupcakes with no decorations and she asked me several times if I was sure about that. She didn’t know what I had planned. But for the smash cake I just told her what the party colors were and this is what they came up with! Perfect!! I didn’t even tell her it was a polka dotty party! I miss Publix SO SO SO much! The smash cake topper was really simple and fun to make. I will do a tutorial on it later in the party series. I think it was simple and classy and the perfect accessory to the cake!

 One of my first crafty loves is cupcake toppers of the printed variety. You can see some that I’ve made HERE and HERE. But this time I wanted to do something a little different. I found the company (company name removed) through a sample sale/discount site Zulily and after a tour through her website I thought I’d take a chance and use edible toppers instead of the printable kind on a stick. I sent her my designs and she sent me 4 frosting sheets with my party logos printing on FROSTING!! How fun is that! They were a definite topic of conversation at the party!

 I had made coordinating cupcake wrappers in the same papers as the cupcake tree, but I ran out of time, it definitely would have made this picture SO much better, but oh well, so is life. No one else knew except me. OH, and ANY photo looks automatically better if you include some Polka Dot Balloons you can buy right here!

 Oh Swiss Cake Roll Fruit Kabobs! They were YUMMY and mostly easy to make, except that the darn swiss cake rolls kept falling off! Again, the Florida heat was not on my side!

So here it is all laid out and ready to chow down! When I look back at the photos I just remind myself that this was a REAL party and not a photo shoot! And you know what? It was a really fun party to celebrate my little stinker turning 1 with family and friends that we don’t get to see very often since we live several states away and that was the best part of it all!!