Well if you've been reading this blog for awhile, you know that Kiddo is a wee bit of a perfectionist, when it comes to parties (and NO, I have no idea where that came from! GRIN!). We call her mini-Martha for a reason-she can critique a party with the best of 'em! So when it comes to HER birthday parties, yes, we tend to a bit above and beyond. It's fun for me, for her, and for her guests!
The best way to set the tone for your party if my the invitation!
Your invitation let's your guests not only know the important things, like time, date and place, it lets them know how formal the party will be, what might be included, and a theme. the last is helpful for kids' parties, as it helps parents come up with a gift idea, if you don't know the child very well!
I printed out Kiddo's baptism and birthday party invites, for the first 3 years. Last year I used a card company, and was very pleased with the results. So when I was contacted by Purple Trail and Wedding Paperie, about reviewing their card sites, I was quite happy to oblige! We had already set the Ladybug theme (which you probably had guessed, had you checked out our Pinterest boards lately), so that was my starting point.
PurpleTrail has some great predesigned birthday and baby/wedding shower invites- all you have to do is add your info! Easy peasy! You can even customize any of the designs however you like by changing the background and print colors, moving the embellishments around, uploading a photo to add to the design.
Plus they have graduation and wedding invites too! Plus they have save the date magnets, stationery, photo books, business cards and you can even email your cards through Purple Trail, or print them at home! HOW cool is that?
I loved these designs:
Train Party: http://www.purpletrail.com/invitations-cards/126416
Cowboy: http://www.purpletrail.com/invitations-cards/157691
Slumber party http://www.purpletrail.com/invitations-cards/161173
Sweet 16: http://www.purpletrail.com/invitations-cards/398390
Then I checked out Wedding Papererie, to see if there was an invite I could adjust for Kiddo's party. They have the MOST gorgeouus wedding invites! Seriously, had I known about them years ago, I would have used them for our wedding shower and wedding invites! They have great Save the Date cards and magnets as well.
Here are some of my favorites from them (warning, I love classic looking invites!):
Black and White Fleur de Lis: http://www.weddingpaperie.com/designs/black-white-fleur-de-lis-wedding-invitation (cause you know you HAVE to have a NOLA invite! LOL)
And check out it's matching Save the Date card: http://www.weddingpaperie.com/designs/black-white-fleur-de-lis-save-the-date-announcement
AND there are matching RSVP, thank you AND mail labels. Oh just SWOON!
This Brown and Blue Stripe is SO SO ala Tiffany's! : http://www.weddingpaperie.com/designs/blue-and-brown-stripes-wedding-invitation
The Modern Kiwi and Grey Stripes Design collection is perfect for a garden wedding: http://www.weddingpaperie.com/design-packages/modern-kiwi-and-gray
In the end, I couldn't find a design that really fit the theme and tone I wanted, so I went back to Purple Trail and decided to upload my own design. First I had to make my design though. I ended up going between 3 scrapbook and printing programs, and finally got a design I liked (Kiddo had a ladybug party for her second birthday, so I wanted to make it different and more unique to her now) and uploaded it, and ordered my flat card invites.
And then I got to find out just HOW super the Purple Trail customer service team is! I would look at the invite on my 17 inch laptop screen and it would look perfect. The Purple Trail team would load it into their card maker and it would be fuzzy or pixilated. I kept changing programs and working with it, but we kept having the same issue. Finally between us all, we figured out how to increase the size from 4x6 to 5x7 on my end, and save at the highest resolution possible. FINALLY, we had success and great looking card!
Forgive the editing out of pertinent details! We love how they turned out, and as you can see, the cards are nice and shiny and look uber-professional! I loves the red/black dotted font for Kiddo's name- it looked like a kid had drawn it! They definitely get your attention!The paper quality for the invite and the envelope are great. They are a great buy!
I took one of Kiddo's large stamps and used it on the envelopes, coloring it in with pencil. They turned out great and really match the invites! Kiddo has some matching labels already, so it will be a nicely tied together invite, that really echoes the theme!
I was very happy with the help and quality of the cards from Purple Trail, and will use them again, and highly recommend them for all your invite and party needs!
Disclosure / Disclaimer: I was given these cards, free of charge,from Purple Trail for review purposes on this blog. No other compensation, monetary or in kind, has been received or implied for this post. Nor was I told how to review them.
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