Hip Hop Ya Don't Stop

This is something that I have already posted about on my family blog forever ago, but I wanted to add it to this blog since it is a party theme idea.

Miss Jayna Berry and I have the same birthday, so I wanted to do something really fun for her first birthday which was back in March. I thought of doing all the usual pretty girly tutu party themes, but none of them seemed to stick with me. One of the first things I ever purchased for Jayna before she was born was a hot pink Puma jacket that had gold pumas and turquoise and white bursts on it. It was so cute and I just pictured my future little girl running around in it. So since it fit her close to her first birthday I decided to use the jacket as my inspiration for our party, and that is how the Hip Hop theme was born.





It was a blast! I had so much fun coming up with games like "fix the grill on lil' Will"(my take on pin the tail on the donkey). We handed out wrist bands to all the guests, had Hip Hop music playing, and Ryan and I wore bouncer necklaces with our pictures in them that had Hip Hop nicknames on them.




I decorated Jaynas high-chair with stickers and this paper garland that I made by sewing together paper circle I punched out.
I had a wall behind her that had pictures of her where I had superimposed her in with celebrities. I signed the pictures like the celebrities themselves had sent them to her with their birthday wishes to her. It was historical and guests loved reading them.





I decorated my fireplace mantel with the party favors and game prizes. The favors were music CD's with Hip Hop music on them. I have a computer that prints on CD's so that is how I got the image directly on the CD. I titled the CD's Tunes from the Crib and handed them out to guests as they left. The game prizes where dollar store perfumes that I made my own labels for so that they would look like Jayna signature perfumes. Every Hip Hop star has their own perfume.



I decorated my shelves and tables with spray-painted microphones, tapes, and records that I found at a local thrift store. I even used the paper I spray painted them on as art in some of my larger frames.





I made food signs for all the food using different HIp Hop slangs and scattered dollar store grills around the table. I had this vision of my cake spinning on a record player the week of the party, but had a terrible time finding one, at least for the price I was willing to spend. I finally found one on Craigslist, but it was in Arizona. I got it though. I sent my brother who lives there into the ghettos of Phoenix to buy it the night before they drove out to Utah to come to the party. I thought the story of getting the record player even fit in nicely with the party theme. I cleaned it up and my vision worked I had a spinning cake by party time. I made a giant cupcake and out of fondant made a gold sparkly necklace with JB on it for Jayna Berry. I practiced making it a couple of times since I had never worked with fondant before, but that actual cake turned out a million times better than any of my practice runs.