My inspiration for Olivia’s Mediterranean birthday party came from two things: her nickname, Baby Olives, and a gorgeous dress our friends got her when they went to Greece.

I made the invitations and envelope liners myself, and because I love beautiful postage stamps, I just had to curate a set of stamps that went along with the Mediterranean theme!

I wanted to have something at the party that the adults could do, so we set up an olive oil tasting game. There were five different olive oils, each with a slightly different flavor profile. The guests were to taste each one and try to match the oil in the dish to the bottle it came from. I chose not to use infused oil flavors just to make the game a bit harder. The winner received, of course, a nice bottle of olive oil!

For the food, my mother and mother-in-law made an amazing Mediterranean feast! A lot of the food was made from produce from our garden (that my husband grew!). We had the tastiest falafel ever with cucumber sauce, rice and lentils, cucumber and tomato salad, caprese skewers, bruschetta, and pesto pasta salad. There were three spreads for the bread and crackers: hummus, baba ganoush, and sun-dried tomato pesto. And we had the most amazing charcuterie board full of extra fixings such as dates, caramelized walnuts, and roasted red peppers.

There were cakes too, although I don’t have any photos of them, unfortunately. We set them on the display stands and bees immediately came for all the sugar on them, so we covered them up until it was time for dessert. I had made mini olive oil bundt cakes with a lemon glaze. If you’ve never had an olive oil cake before, it’s a traditional Italian cake made with olive oil instead of butter. We also had adorable sugar cookies made by Dorothy Ann Bakery. Lemons, flowers, and number ones!

For the kids, we held a simple Olympic Games. There was the long jump, discus, balance beam, hurdles, javelin throw, and a race. We used a frisbee for the discus and a dowel for the javelin throw. When it was over, the kids lined up and we had a little “ceremony” where they were awarded their metals!

The party was held in a park right on the Mississippi River. A cool, foggy morning turned into a beautiful, sunny 80 degrees.

We had a wonderful day celebrating our baby girl! She is our pride and joy, and we love her so much.