"Night Owl" Party Invitations!

Lilah has "big sister" envy. Fortunately, she is blessed with older and beautiful, godly sisters in Christ who love on her.  Since January, Lilah has been "planning" her birthday party.  I wasn't planning on doing a party.  After age 5, my plans, due to my personality and my intense LOVE for party planning, were to only have milestone parties. However, Lilah had other ideas and I loved her thoughts, so I decided, "What the heck?!?! Okay!"  Lilah wanted to have Ansley (7), Cami (12), and Taylor (12) over for a slumber party.   I figured I would just do the typical sleepover stuff..., but as I began planning the evening, my ideas began to go hay wire. Surprised? Haha. I'm not. How was I going to entertain 2 kids and 2 almost teenagers?  Lilah is 6 going on 16. Haha. I wasn't worried about her hanging with the older girls, I was more worried the older girls would be bored.

I wanted to incorporate the sleepover theme into her invitation and I also wanted to include owls (Lilah and I LOVE owls). That idea would have sufficed, but something was still missing.  Something that would bridge the gap between the little girls to the big girls.  I found inspiration from this invitation, sold on etsy @ LeslieZanderDesign.  I "convo-ed" her, but she wanted $15 for a jpeg file.  It wasn't the look of the invitation that I liked.  It was the text conversation style that I fell in love with.  Since I wasn't crazy about the look of her invite and I felt $15, just to print 4 invitations, was a little much, I decided to try and make my own invitations.  I LOVE how our invitations turned out so much.  I actually LOVE them way more!!! Hehe. 

Rough Draft #1

Rough Draft #2

Rough Draft #3

Rough Draft #4

Final copy.  I think it's easy enough to see the changes that took place from one draft to the next.

I was so happy that I was able to incorporate key owl words into the invitation, such as, "Whooo","Night Owl", "Fly", and "Nest".  I fell in love with the style of the invite (text conversation) because it's perfect for BOTH ages, being both age groups know about and love their iPods. Once I printed the invitations, I decided to stick a hot blue OR hot pink cardstock paper to the back and a 3-D owl sticker to the front.  The stickers came with 9 owls in the pack.  The photo below shows what was left after choosing the cutest owls for each girls invitation. 

I like the few additions. It made the invite "pop" more.

Why the colorful cheetah background? IF you are a loyal reader, you have read multiple times, in my birthday planning posts, that I always feel a party's focus should be on 3 specific items: invitation, cake, and party favors.  The invitation sets the tone for what's to come and gets the guests excited about the party.  I knew having a slumber party would provide for a fun invitation "insert".  I rarely just do a paper invite.  I love giving the guests a little pre-favor (if you will).  I found these adorable "BFF" pillows at Justice. PERFECT!!! BFF aka "Best Friends Forever" keeps up with the informal text abbreviations.  Ansley and Lilah are BFFs as are Taylor and Cami!  Everything was flowing so well together.  

Together, the pillow forms a heart. It is joined together purposefully with velcro, so that one half can be given to a friend. Score! I only had to buy 2 pillows!!! These pillows are what created the need for the colorful cheetah background on the invitation!  Even IF the guests didn't put two and two together, I wanted everything to flow.  Below you can see Lilah's half of the pillow.

Complete? NOT YET!!! I wish I could add that "EEEEK!" emoticon here.  LOL! I would have been done except, while shopping for the pillows, at Justice, I found these ADORABLE "Birthday Mix NOT Match" socks.  When I spotted these socks, I gasped in the store and said "No Way!" That's how excited I was. Lol!  The ONLY stinky thing about these socks is that they came with 3 and I needed 4 (2 per person).  So I had to buy 4 packs instead of 3. 

I tried the BIG GIRLS' socks on my feet, just to see what they looked like on! Too cute!

How did I present the invite and the slumber party favors to our guests?

I rolled up the socks to look like cupcakes and inserted a candle in the center!

Can you BELIEVE I found cupcake liners to match the pillow and invitation background?  YES, I really gasped at that find!

Then, I placed BOTH the mix not match socks and the invitation in an adorable, handmade owl bag.

I will do a separate post on the owl gift bags.  I'll share all of the items I used to make them! Easy peasy and beautiful!!!! OWL LOVE THEM!

 How did I deliver the pillow? I found these ADORABLE bags at the DOLLAR TREE, on the beauty aisle.  

I found these gem letters at A.C. Moore.  They came in pink, purple, and green.  Lilah wanted green.  She's got great taste! They matched perfect.

 The first letter of each of their names could spell a slang word... "TALC" aka talk!

I adhered the letter to the front of each bag!  The letters were $1.99 each.  So the entire bag cost $3.00.  

Now that the invitation is out, I feel relieved. I normally pass invitations out 4-6 weeks in advance, but the girls already knew the party date, so I didn't feel the need to give them an invitation that far in advanced.  We hand delivered the invitations, to the girls, after church yesterday!  It sounds like everyone is really excited!!! Be on the look out for the rest of the parties details after it's over!!! We plan to party OWL night and sleep OWL day!