Tutto Bella Blog

Looking at this Tiki Surfer party makes me wish I was in Hawaii, or at least a guest at the tropical paradise Sheena {talented party planning mom} created in her backyard for her son’s 1st birthday!

Sheena and her husband went above and beyond to make their son’s birthday memorable and fun! And, a bonus for them, they get to keep the Tiki bar! Keshia of Photos by Keshia captures all the lei’s and tiki’s in action.

With great enthusiasm, Sheena shares more of the party details below…

Sheena used her husband’s handy skills {she said he can build or make just about anything…you lucky lady} for party props. He made the realistic life-size surfboards {10 of them} they placed around the party, 2 tiki totem poles that greeted guests on both sides of the driveway, and he built the fantastic Tiki Bar.

I had 2 signature cocktails that I had served from the Tiki Bar in plastic tiki cocktail glasses that I found at the dollar store. For the kids I had them drinking out of plastic coconut cups.

We found an antique wood highchair and painted it to match the party so we would have an awesome cake smash setting!

For a more tropical setting, we bought many fake tropical flowers and placed them in existing greenery and plants. I made a dress-up station located at the entrance where party goers could pick various items to complete their luau look! There were beachcomber hats, tiki masks, flower hair clips, sunglasses, flower anklets/bracelets, and of course grass skirts for the girls.

I found tiki head pots and used them for my centerpieces with tropical flowers placed in them. I hot glued more of the flowers around the tabletop tiki torches to add more color. Different color tablecloths on all the tables really brightened everything up too. For the chairs I simply put a lei on the back of each and told the guests as they got there to make sure they picked one to put on.

As far as food, no luau would be complete without a pig with hat and sunglasses! We simply ordered that from a local town. We also had chicken and shrimp kabobs with pineapple, small ears of corn, coconut rice, and lots of veggies. For dessert, I put blue jello in individual cups with spoon and a gummy shark in it and called it shark infested water. Those were a big hit. I made cake balls to look like a pina colada drink in coconuts. I also made pretzel totem poles by using icing to glue tiki head sugar dec-ons to a pretzel rods and standing  them in crushed graham crackers. I had made surfboard cookies also, but that was the one thing I forgot unfortunately. I had the cake and cupcakes done by a local baker but I did design them all.

As far as activities, in the pool I got shark and surfboard inflatables and the kids absolutely loved them. I had music from the beach boys and any other surfer songs playing throughout the party. And, we had a limbo set that the kids had a lot of fun playing.

You thought of everything adorable for this party Sheena. And, from the looks of it…you had one happy boy!

We can’t wait to see what you come up with when Ryker turns 2!

{images via Photos by Keshia}