An Ice Cream First Birthday Party

From the hanging circled photos to the to-die-for dessert bar, this ice cream-inspired first birthday party is jammed packed with vintage delicious details.

Photographer: Sharon Arnoldi Photography | Specialty Foods: Blissful Bites Cake Pops | Event Designer: Put A Bow On It Notes from Mom and Photographer, Sharon Arnoldi: Its hard to know where to start on this one... this has been a dream birthday party celebration for the last few months. I worked with birthday party designers, Annie & Katie, with put a bow on it to create some magical decorations for my daughter Elise's birthday. The party inspiration came from the invitation (the last two images in the set) which I hand created. One of my friends drew the ice cream cone and I watercolored it, scanned it in and photoshopped it to the perfect color then added the text. We went with ice cream social because I thought the food for guests would be cute and easy. I created a custom matching sign for the front door and a canvas sign to hang over the mantel. Put a bow on it created the hanging fabric "lanterns" which were made out of embroidery hoops, fabric puff balls, and fabric ice cream cones. Our colors were pink, teal and white. We went for a modern take on shabby chic having bold repeating circle patterns with accents of frilly lace. We put photos in embroidery hoops and hung them in a large display� the photos were see through so they could be enjoyed from both sides. I really challenged put a bow on it to take a step back from all those pinterest parties and really show something new, we did not use mason jars, instead we had glass jars with pink lemonade, and for the adults we served champagne from a celebration cart to celebrate that we the parents made it through the first year! The ice cream was served in buckets with wooden spoons. The fabulous cake was created by one of my photo clients for me� and the cake smash chair was an old wooden school desk. As a photographer having photos displayed from the first year was super important to me but a tiny little banner didn't cut it so I had 12 10x10 canvas's made one from each month and those were hung over the couch.