He Guides Me: You know you have a horse lover when....

You know you have a horse loving daughter when she decides to trade in the pool parties (I can't lie, we've only had one! But isn't that what June birthday's are all about?) for a birthday part at the BARN! Acilia has been riding at a local barn for almost a year now and when we saw on one of the brochures that they do birthday parties, it was set. Last Wednesday we celebrated Acilia's 9th birthday with a small group of kids. 3 were cousins, 3 were friends from school and 1 was her bestie from our last school. I had in mind to keep it "simple". The barn owner actually laughed at me when I said that, she knows I can't keep things simple, my old email was "Little Miss Planner" :) Jokes aside, that was my mission. As a previous wedding planner, I know the joys of details, but I also know the details go unnoticed when it comes to kids, if you have good food and activities to combat boredom, you have a success! We had food, I was thrilled to find a party tray at Jewel that had triangle cut PB&J sandwiches with bite sized brownies and gummy worms in the middle. Sign me up!

I kept with the "horse" theme and got apples and carrots to bring some "healthy eating" to the mix. Then we rounded out with pretzels and water bottles. Simple simple! :)

The bonus was towards the end of the party, we had enough carrots to go feed them to the horses in the barn!

You may notice my color scheme is not "typical" for a barn party, my justification is this, when you have a daughter who's been having horse themed birthdays for the past 7 years, you would break away from the browns and reds too!

Color scheme was blue and purple. Blue is Acilia's favorite color and purple compliments it quite well!

Favors worked out great! I happened to be at a Scholastic warehouse sale where if you could fill a box, you paid $12.50 for whatever was in it! I found Ponylicious books there, that retail for $11 each, put 9 of them in the box and still had room for other items! SCORE!! I went to Celebrate Express where they had the napkins I chose and saw they had a bag of 24 mini horses for a few bucks per bag. I ordered one bag and was able to give the party attendees 3 horses a piece! I went to Oriental Trading where I found multicolored cowboy/cowgirl hats for a great price! Favors complete and they didn't break the bank!!

The birthday girl and her best friend Maddie

We filled our free time with drawing pictures! I bought brand new markers and sparkle crayons and just brought some computer paper.

The 30 minute horse back riding lesson was the highlight of the party! All of the kids LOVED the experience and I've been told by their parents they are still talking about it :)