Blogger, Hoang-Kim, her husband and daughter in front of a floral first birthday party backdrop

I cannot believe our daughter is ONE! Planning her first birthday party made me so excited. I woke up giddy the day of her party and may have been more excited than on our wedding day! Dripping flowers, vibrant colors and bright sunshine made for the most beautiful day filled with family and friends. The first birthday is a big deal in Vietnamese and Taiwanese culture. Couple that with her party happening the weekend of our wedding anniversary, we wanted to go all out! Keep scrolling to see how we transformed our backyard into a fun secret garden for a floral first birthday party!

She Is One Wild Flower

Floral first birthday party flowers with ranunculus, anenome, roses, peonies, carnations and more.

Palette knife cake for a floral first birthday party with Glo Party Co backdrop

Party Planning & Coordination

I knew I wanted a floral first birthday party for our daughter. She has such a vibrant personality and the brightest smile. I started searching for ideas on Pinterest using keywords “floral first birthday” and “floral birthday party” and saw so much inspiration. I compiled my favorite photos to a board and started seeing similarities. From there, I was able to nail down a color palette and moldboard. I used Pantone Connect to grab the exact Pantone colors, which I knew would be helpful in creating the invitation suite, signage and sending along to vendors!

She is one wild flower birthday party moodboard

This is my overall moldboard. I also made specific mood boards for the florist, backdrop vendor and balloon vendor! I find when working with vendors, it’s best to be very specific and clear about what you like, what you don’t like and what you’re envisioning. Creating a detailed moldboard with text explaining colors and what drew you to each image really helps nail down the vision!

I planned every last detail of this part, but knew the day of I wanted to focus on our daughter and hosting. I hired a day-of coordinator from Styled in White, who I couldn’t recommend more! Sarah, the founder, helped me plan my best friend’s baby shower I hosted and her lead planner Rachael took charge for our daughter’s first birthday! She hopped on board in the beginning stages just to get a general idea of the party. She had recommendations for the layout for our backyard and was so helpful if we needed anything via email. Two weeks before the party, we did an in-person meeting and she touched base with vendors to coordinate logistics for setup.

Pro Tip!

If you can, I highly recommend having everything set up and to be ready before your baby’s first nap! If you’re throwing a first birthday party, this could be a gamechanger for you! I wish I had thought of this so Johnny and I could have gotten more photos with our daughter and of her by herself before the party started. She woke up from her nap mid-party so we were in a bit of a rush to get our photos, family photos, photos with friends and everything else!

Back Drop

Blogger Hoang-Kim and her daughter in front of a She is one wild flower party backdrop by Glo Party Co with wood lettering and a floral cluster from Something Pretty Floral

Johnny and I saw a similar backdrop on Instagram and fell in love! We wanted something big enough to where our families could fit in front for photos and also to create our little world! I wanted the wood trim detailing on the side panels to add a little interest. I typically do acrylic signage, but our vendor recommended wood so there isn’t any glare. I love how it turned out! Looking back, I do wish I had put either more florals or some type of floral design on the side panels, but that’s me being nitpicky!

Florals & Make Your Own Arrangement Cart

Make your own floral arrangement cart at a floral first birthday party with flowers from Something Pretty Floral on a white cart with green, pink, orange and cream balloons

Bright pink roses, orange roses, spray flowers and light pink carnations from Something Pretty Floral

Our favorite florist, Something Pretty Floral, really blossomed and made the party. After all, you can’t have a floral first birthday party without flowers! She made large arrangements at the bottom of the backdrop so it would look like they were growing up and a petite bundle at the top. On the kids tables she created little arrangements. I can’t help but smile when I see these! The colors are so happy and vibrant! Simply perfect for a kids birthday party.

I really wanted any moms or ladies who came to the party to leave with something pretty. Working with a few vendors, we created a flower cart where guests could make their own floral arrangements to take home! It was a hit and I really appreciated how not just the kiddos got a favor.

Kids Tables

I fell in love with these bow chairs the moment I saw them! I love the wicker look and how feminine they are. Plus, I think kids’ items are simply so adorable. It was important to me the kids table items are compostable and not single-use plastic. There are so many beautiful options now and we found the perfect scallop pink plates! We paired them with compostable bamboo flatware adults would use, too. I love how everything is cohesive for the floral first birthday party.

For the kids party favors, we gifted everyone a silicone straw cup. These came in a set of two and while they are a little more expensive… I got so much great feedback. To be honest, I think most kids party favors aren’t practical or useful. We end up donating most of it and that can be such a waste of money. I’d rather spend a little more money but have it be useful to the parents who are coming to our party. To make sure guests knew these were favors, I made a little note saying thank you for coming and used gold ribbon to tie it to the straw! Luckily, we had leftover ribbon from our wedding to use!

Thôi Nôi / Leaving The Cradle Tradition

In Vietnamese culture, there is a tradition called, Thôi Nôi, which translates to leaving the cradle. Thôi Nôi represents the family’s belief in a bright future for the baby. Various objects will be placed in front of the baby. The first item chosen is thought to predict the baby’s profession.

I wanted to make this tradition more interactive for our guests so I made signs explaining the tradition as well as the items we would have for our daughter to pick from. I got these brass frames for the signs, which I plan on using again for hosting. They are incredible quality and the price was reasonable! Then, I used glasses we already had and taped a photo of each item to it. I created a raffle ticket guests could tear and place into the jars! Once our daughter chose her item, I randomly picked three tickets from the jar of the item she chose for prizes!

Before we did the Thoi Noi tradition, our immediate family came together to do an offering to Buddha and our ancestors. It’s to thank both for watching over our daughter and family during this first critical year of her life and to ask for their protection throughout her life. For our offering, we had a mix of traditional items including fruit, sticky rice and sweet pudding. We also added in a modern item, our pizza!

Invitation

I will forever send out paper invitations in the mail. I think there is something so special about getting it in the mail and opening it. Since I designed the invitation myself, I needed a place to print them. However, I didn’t just want standard white envelopes. I’m so glad I found Truly Engaging!

Truly Engaging is probably the only website I found where you could upload you own design and customize the envelopes, liner and more. All the other sites you could personalize their designs, but not upload your own. Plus, the paper quality is phenomenal. The invitations has a luxe velvet like feel and we opted for the pearl envelopes.

Food & Desserts

Johnny and I are not light bites people. We love food and we always want our family and friends to come with hungry bellies and leave full. Thinking through different cuisines, we thought pizza would be fun if done correctly! We’re big fans of thin, crispy crust so we had Cane Rosso bring their brick oven to our home and make pizza fresh. This also works great for those who want custom toppings or are gluten-free. They batch made some pizzas and also did custom orders.

For dessert, we had her beautiful cake and cupcakes! The cupcakes were more muffin sized and I asked for them to look like flowers! Our baker, Kaylie did a great job with both! For the cake, we wanted lemon flavor and I love how it was moist and a good ratio of frosting to cake. We had a couple different flavors of cupcakes so guests could have options!

Kids Soft Play Area

This is our first kids birthday party and I wanted to make sure some of the older kids has things to do! We got a soft-play area, which had a bounce house and ball pit. There’s also a few little slides and tunnels for kiddos to play with. It was a hit and I love how it all came together. To tie it into our theme and colors, I had a balloon garland made for the bounce house. For the ball pit, we chose green, hot pink and light pink balls for a little pop!

Other Details

Since we don’t have outdoor speakers in our patio area, we brought back our favorite DJ from our wedding, Adante Mayo! He was there live mixing music and was able to help us make a few announcements. Plus, he had a microphone so my Mom could share about the Vietnamese Thoi Noi tradition and so we could easily thank all of our guests for attending.

No party is complete without drinks! We had a bartender to serve a variety of drinks. I love how she brought her own mobile bar and supplies to keep everything cold. We supplied the drinks and she brought the ice, coolers, syrups and anything else needed. Of course, I made a drink menu sign coordinating the invitation suite.