It's official. I am the parent of a 16 year old. A permit-ted by the Massachusetts RMV to drive 16 year old no less. And that's all she wants to do...but that's a story for another day.
This past Saturday we had Ebby's Sweet 16 Party. Nothing crazy, a small scale gathering at home this year. When we were brainstorming a theme a few months ago I asked Ebby what her favorite colors were. Basically, all of them. So that's what we ran with, a colorful, rainbow-inspired Sweet 16 party. For a crafty peep, a colorful/rainbow-inspired theme is a goldmine for decoration inspiration.
I started with a Pinterest board (see it here: Rainbow Sweet 16) and added my own twist to several of the ideas. What ideas? Well, let's take a look...
At the front of the house, my Girl (aka tattered vintage dressform) got dressed up in a rainbow tulle skirt I made by gathering strips of tulle and sewing them on a wide grosgrain ribbon.
She also got a tissue paper flower pin ~ so fetching! Ebby agreed...
Also at the front of the house, I made these decorated plant stakes. The one on the right is totally leaning in to being a party decoration...
The plant stakes were made by:
1. spray painting a section of cheap (Dollar Tree) foam core
2. cutting out decorative squares
3. using a combination of handwriting with a marker and glitter, glue and a stamp, writing 'Sweet 16'
4. cutting several lengths of ribbon and tulle in different colors
5. tying ribbon around bamboo poles
6. using clear packing tape, affixing foam core squares to bamboo poles
A close-up picture would've been good there...
Most of the party activities were outdoors, but we did have a few indoor decorations including this Sweet Sixteen banner handcrafted by Bubbe the Beautiful:
These gift bags acted as decorations until we were ready to use them (hello there Lulie Wallace flower painting):
Moving outside, we were oh-so-fortunate to have a sunny, not too humid day after an up and down week.
The Wish Wheel was one of my favorites:
That's an old bike wheel (rescued from the trash) spray painted white with lots of glitterly clothespins. Inspiration struck when it was time to write out the instructions for the Wish Wheel...
I used my set of vintage alphabet stamps in a rainbow of colors to stamp out 'WRITE A WISH' on top of a piece of white cardstock. The rest of the instrux were typed on the computer and printed out. The trickiest part was getting the sheet of cardstock into the vintage typewriter ~ it's in $5 at a yard sale condition...
Here's a peek at {most} of the Wish Wheel table:
Just a bit washed out in the bright sunshine (thank you iPhone...)
For this party, I finally mastered the art of the tissue paper pom pom. Yay me!
We used fishing line to hang a bunch from the patio umbrella:
I even used a few as flowers in my sprayed painted tin can vases:
They looked lovely with the rainbow banner hung from the food table...
I even managed to whip up a few '16' paper pinwheels to put in the vases, despite an uncooperative glue gun.
My favorite decoration of the whole party was the photo booth we created by hanging crepe paper streamers from a metal arched arbor. So. Many. Pretty. Colors...
And my favorite decoration in the photo booth set-up (aside from Ebby of course...) was definitely the oversized '16' numbers:
I had way too much fun making those numbers:
1. Using cheap (Dollar Tree) foam core, sketch and cut out your oversized number(s)
2. Gather pretty much all the cupcake liners you have in the house--hoarding comes in handy here, I only had to buy 2 colors that I didn't have on hand!
3. Starting with first color, fold cupcake liner in half horizontally. Place a dab of hot glue on one side of the fold to secure then fold in half vertically. Cupcake liner should now look like a fan with a rounded edge. Using hot glue, attach fold liner to the foam core.
4. Repeat 200+ times, switching colors as desired, until numbers are covered
Caution: you may love these decorations so much that you move them to your living room when the party's over.
Not that I did that...ok, fine, I totally did!
Up next: the colorful Photo Booth
Thanks for stopping by,
