These photos make my heart swell times x a bazillion so today I am selfishly sharing photos of Archer’s 1st birthday (and my 34th) party. I shared a few sneak peeks via instagram but I had Birds of a Feather shoot so I could enjoy the party and know all the memory capturing was in good hands.

This was my first ever kids party and let me tell you, I was a teensy bit terrified except not the teensy part! I mean, kids and other people’s kids at my house, what in the world will I do with them? First I decided to pick a theme… and Johnny Cash it was! You see, Archer, Johnny, and I were all born on the same day, I wanted a unique theme that the adults would enjoy too, and I love me some Johnny, so it was kind of perfect.

When I started brainstorming about activities and games for the kids I looked to Johnny Cash lyrics. I had the ring-of-fire ring toss, and a cardboard castle that I spray painted and turned into Folsom Prison. Other themed pieces of the party were a “tour bus” tent, guitar piñata (that i filled with toys like blow up guitars, sunglasses, microphones, & squirt guns) and the prison line-up backdrop I made for the AmuseBooth Photo Booth.

The best thing we did was hire a live band and they were AMAZING. They’re called The Duquesnes and they covered Johnny for us, naturally. Listening to them, dancing with Rupert, with Archie on my hip, was hands down my favorite part of the day.

Archie getting his first taste of cake was pretty great too though.

I was planning on making Archie’s cake but somewhere between Folsom prison spray painting, and creating a June-esque outfit to wear I was running real short on time so I bought those little angel food cake rounds from whole foods, trimmed around the edges to make them a more perfect cylinder and stacked it three high layering it with icing between. I did make the icing from scratch so I think that was a good time-save/made with love compromise. Plus it turned out pretty darn cute.

The jumbo sized Archie print came from our portrait session with Love Child Photo. I might just wallpaper every room with Archie faces.

Our modern pergola got finished just in the nick of time, we set the food up buffet style here.

A bit more Amusebooth fun…And my favorite photo of the day… little Archer (mini Johnny) covered in icing, playing the harmonica (or eating it, basically the same).

Photos by Birds of a Feather // Photo Booth by Amusebooth // Music by The Duquesnes

See more photos over on 100 Layer Cakelet