Paw-sitively Fabulous: Holly's Second Birthday Party

Holly & I were sad to send her Grandma back home to Colorado this morning, but loved having her in town for the past week! We had so much fun hanging out and enjoying the city, and this past weekend was packed with Holly's Second Birthday Party Saturday and our Barkfest at Sniffany's photo shoot Sunday (more on that later, though you can see a preview of the pics over on our Instagram).

Saturday promised bright skies and warm weather after a few days of rain, which was perfect for our outdoor venue of the West 79th Street Boat Basin. Lucky for us, even if it had rained, the covered portion of the restaurant is also pup friendly, but the sun stayed out and there was a breeze off the water that made the weather positively party-ready! We decided to ditch the matching black polo shirt idea and instead went with a polka dot theme for our ensembles--me in an old Betsey Johnson dress, and Holly in a cute little number from Baxter Boo. Even Grandma got in on the matching fun with a polka dot blouse!

Holly, my mom, and I ready to party in polka dots!

We arrived a little bit before 1:00pm and there was plenty of seating, so we were offered a large table in the back where we could set up shop and display our custom cupcakes from Georgetown Cupcake (a custom "logo" or photograph can be added free of charge to large orders, just e-mail the store's catering manager for more info), and home baked pupcakes using Puppy Cake batter. Many more pups came with their parents this year, so Holly was glad we came prepared with treats for them too!!

A close up on the gorgeous and scrumptious cupcakes created by Georgetown!

Lexie is Holly's bestie from our block--they wanted to play so badly they wouldn't even hold still for a picture!

Holly with new friends Zoe and Guiness (and their humans)

Our registry at myregistry.com proved to be a huge success--but there were some great gifts from off the registry as well! Michelle's beau picked out a couple great toys including Holly's new favorite rope chew (she has since brought it with her everywhere she walks in the apartment), and Mariel brought some hilarious (and great smelling) Juicy Crittoure by Juicy Couture Pawfum Puppy Perfume that I know will come in handy between baths when Holly still needs to smell her best at the park!

Holly checking out the Juicy Crittoure Pawfum. Sniff approved!

Posing with the Bloomingdale's "Little Dog Bowl" from the registry! Thanks Michelle!!

It was great seeing all of Holly's human and pup friends, and we can't wait until next year's celebration!

The whole crew--thanks to everyone who came out to celebrate!

Until Next Time, Darlings!

Paw-sitively Fabulous: Prepping for Holly's Second Birthday

I can't believe it's been nearly a year since Holly's First Birthday Bash! Knowing that this year has to be twice as nice (or two times the fun!), I have already been making plans for this year's event. While some details are still in the works, I wanted to share some of the early stage plans sure to make this year a tail wagging good time!

Once again, we decided to go with celebrations.com (formerly Pingg) to craft e-mail save the dates and invites. The website has a handy tracking process where you can see who has opened your e-mail and track RSVPs, and will automatically send a reminder the day before your event--much higher tech than your standard Facebook invite! I also love that the site offers a wide variety of templates that you can insert your own images in. We used ones with a bright, preppy feel for the Save the Date and Invite to create a cohesive theme.

As much as we love you, we can't invite everyone! Dates have been removed.

I used this picture on both the invite & the save the date since it makes me laugh!

An absolute must this year is matching outfits. Since I love the way my professional photos with Holly turned out, I decided to go with Ralph Lauren again, this time with classic polo shirts in black so my mom can get in on the matching fun as well! Holly will be getting a custom Big Pony Monogram Polo shirt from Ralph Lauren Home. Adding her name is complimentary and that way everyone will know who the most pup-ular gal in town is on her special day!

The polo comes in several bright colors, but we're sticking with basic black.

Finally, in the past year I have had several people say they have trouble getting gifts for Holly because a) she already has everything and b) since she is a rescue dog, figuring out sizing for outfits can be tricky. Since I hardly expect everyone I know to carry around a card with Holly's measurements on it for proper outfit buying, I decided to create a gift registry for Holly's party. Of course, the presence of our guests is the real present, but this way should they feel so inclined there is a list of pre selected gifts that Holly doesn't have, and outfits with the size already selected. We used myregistry.com since it can synch the registries from several sites (including Bloomingdale's), and pull items from sites without registries with a button similar to the "Pin It" button from Pinterest. Our registry pulls from some of our favorite places: Henri Bendel, Wag.com, and of course Bloomingdale's. Of course everything we picked is fabulous, but some of our absolute faves are below.

Isaac Mizrahi Leopard Collection Pullover. Buy it here.

Bloomingdale's Little Dog Bowl. Buy it here.

Henri Bendel "Squeak & Chic" dog toy. Buy it here.

Until Next Time, Darlings!

Paw-sitively Fabulous: Holly's First Birthday Party

Since Holly's adoption day is coming up (November 4th!), I decided it was a good time to talk about the other major milestone from this year: her first birthday party.

When I adopted Holly, they estimated that her birthday was June 1st. I knew immediately I wanted to make it a huge event--and when I saw the date fell on a Saturday, I started planning.

Something as important as a pup's first birthday called for much more than a standard Facebook event, where people tend to RSVP early on and then forget the event is taking place, or simply not show up. Since I knew I would need to find a venue with enough outdoor space to accommodate the whole party, an exact head count was key. My friend's older sister had recently used Pingg, a website that has free online invitations that come in super cute e-envelopes, to create the evites for her bridal shower. I used the site to create both a Save The Date that went out in early May as well as the official invite.

Once RSVPs started to come in, I had a clearer idea of how many human and puppy guests we should be planning for. I wasn't the only one excited to celebrate Holly's big birthday--the final headcount was close to 20 people and 2 pups! After researching dog friendly venues in Manhattan, I settled on The West 79th Street Boat Basin, which has a large covered patio area that is pooch friendly and shaded from the sticky Summer sun.

With venue and guest list in place, it was time to get to work on the stuff that really mattered: outfits and sweets! I managed to score a Lilly Pulitzer "meadow" skirt on sale at the Madison Avenue store, which I paired with a Threads For Thought scoop neck tee for the party and later with my Ralph Lauren button down for our photo shoot. Holly wore her Sam & Tasha sundress, with the blue floral pattern facing out.

Holly was having so much fun she didn't even want to pose for a picture! The ribbon says "Birthday Girl."

We had special treats for puppies and people. For the four-legged guests, I turned to You Lucky Dog in Hoboken, New Jersey, which sells super cute dog-friendly cakes and "pupcakes" that can be personalized for any occasion. For Holly's party we ordered pupcakes with pink frosting and white "H" decorations. They were a big hit, but Holly didn't like that she had to share.

Wolfing down the pupcake before any of her human friends steal it!

For people treats, I used my favorite trendy Manhattan cupcake bakery, Georgetown Cupcake (of TLC's "DC Cupcake" fame). Georgetown allows you to make orders online for delivery (perfect for me since their downtown location is a bit out of my way), and if you are ordering over a certain amount, you can add a personalized "logo" for free! My very talented friend had made a pillow featuring Holly in the famous "Holly Golightly" pose for me for Christmas, and after sending over the image in an e-mail, Georgetown was able to use that image to create custom fondant for the cupcakes for Holly's party. As always, they tasted as great as they looked. We even shared some with our waiters, who were super accommodating with everything from finding us a table on a very busy afternoon to letting us sit and hang out long after our food was gone.

The custom cupcake motif was so cute! We got 2 dozen of Georgetown's delicious flavors--the biggest hit was peanut butter!

Holly posing with her cupcake twin! She was mad Mommy wouldn't let her eat this one too :)

Holly was spoiled rotten with so many sweet and thoughtful presents! I went a little overboard (it was her first birthday, after all), and got her several toys from the Haute Diggity Dog line of toys. In addition to the "Birthday Girl" cake, she got a "Muttsoni" purse. She also loved her Fab Dog MetroCard toy, and her PetProjekt Squeeki Shellz Conch (though she chewed it to smithereens).

I may have been as excited about the presents as Holly was.

The day ended with a tired puppy and an even more tired Mommy & Grandma, but I would call it a resounding success.

Sleepy birthday pup!

Now what to do for her SECOND birthday...

Until Next Time, Darlings!