Our Very Hungry Caterpillar Turns 2!

I started planning Addy's 2nd birthday about the time her 1st birthday ended.  I was in Target & saw these adorable little buckets that were Very Hungry Caterpillar themed.  Addy LOVES that book & I started thinking about how cute that would be for her 2nd birthday.  Well, I got on Pinterest & low & behold...there are about a million ideas for a Very Hungry Caterpillar birthday party. 

Here is what our final table looked like.  I can tell you that it actually almost hurts me to look at this picture since I have some serious OCD about parties & the table is not centered.  It started out centered, but apparently while I was inside bringing out more food, a fan was brought out & plugged in near the table & people moved the table over to accommodate space for the fan.  It gets blazing hot in the south...even at the end of September, so I didn't mind the fan & really was so busy that I didn't even notice the off-center table...until the pictures & now it is all I can see.  Mental note to continue checking the centeredness of the table at all times during parties.  : ) 

Anyway, moving on.  I knew I wanted to keep the colors of bright red, light green & dark green.  I wanted to use some of the ideas I had seen on Pinterest (because some were just way too cute not to), but do some originals too.  I knew I wanted to incorporate caterpillars as much as possible & that I wanted to serve the foods that the caterpillar eats throughout the book. 

Most of the foods were pretty self-explanatory...oh he ate a pear?  Great, I will serve pears.  But I wanted to change things up just a little bit, especially when it came to the sweets.  I decided that for the apples, ice cream cones & cherry pies...that all of those things would need to involve cupcakes.  ; )  I won't spoil all of that in this post though...check out the links below in a couple of days where you can see how to make apple cupcakes, ice cream cone cupcakes & cherry pie cupcakes.  Oh & cupcakes that are green & red like the caterpillar too...although they are pretty self explanatory.  : )

One of the first things that I worked on were the invitations.  I was worried that these would be a huge pain since cutting circles usually is, but you can see on the post here about Very Hungry Caterpillar invitations...it wasn't so bad & I thought the invitations really turned out cute. 

This party drove my husband nuts because I definitely set up my faux table in our dining room about 3-4 months before this party happened.  There was just so much that I wanted going on with this table, that I really had to visualize it all in person.  Once I decided on the exact party foods, I moved the serving dishes around constantly until I finally got a schematic that I liked. 

The decorations you can read more about here, but were mostly Very Hungry Caterpillar things that Addy had around her playroom, or things that I just made pretty easy on the computer.  One of the banners was done on my computer, while the other was done the same way I did the invitations.  The hanging signs were pretty simple too & you can see how I made them on the decorations post as well.

The party turned out to be so much fun.  Addy girl played & played with all of her friends & everyone seemed to enjoy themselves.  I will say that in the future, unless I know it is going to be a little cooler, I may not make so many cupcakes when it is still so blazing hot outside.  Ahhh, the South.  : )

Very Hungry Caterpillar - Party Invitations Post
Very Hungry Caterpillar - Party Food Post
Very Hungry Caterpillar - Apple Cake & Cupcakes
Very Hungry Caterpillar - Cherry Pie Cupcakes
Very Hungry Caterpillar - Ice Cream Cone Cupcakes
Very Hungry Caterpillar - Guestbook & Favors Post
Very Hungry Caterpillar - Party Banners Post
Very Hungry Caterpillar - Party Decorations Post