Emilia's First Birthday Party

I'd been thinking about Emilia's first birthday for a while, and then I started inviting people. Before I knew it, I'd invited 28 adults and 15 kids age 5 and under! What have I done?!?!

We rented the amenities room at my parents' complex and prayed for sunshine. Answered! We had her party on the nicest day of the year so far. Most of the party was held outside, but there was the big room inside as an option as well. I always love planning and prepping for parties, but then I host it and I feel so distracted and end up just sort of floating around half-engaging with everyone. I'll have to work on that. 

I am very grateful there were lots of pictures taken yesterday, because then I can actually sit down and reflect and reminisce when I'm not zipping around carrying a baby!

We went to church yesterday morning and then came home for Emilia's first nap. When she got up I went to my parents' place to set up and Dom was supposed to nap. 99.5% of the time he will sleep 12-2/230, or at least happily chat for 2 hours. Yesterday was the first time in recent history he completely refused his nap and cried on and off. Great! What a perfect day for you to be a cranky pants!! (I found out that the party outfit I put on his dresser by his crib had been brought into the crib and he got stuck in the shirt trying to put it on. That explains it. Oops!). We gave up on his nap and went back to my parents' for Emilia's nap. Put her down, and she cries for 20 minutes... again, she NEVER cries for sleep, even at their house usually. Nooo!!! She did get about 40 minutes of sleep though, just enough to get her through!

Alas, both the kids did awesome at the party and seemed to enjoy themselves. Emilia was still Emilia and definitely clung to me, but she also took it all in and toddled around in her adorable party dress. Dominic had an absolute blast. He played inside at the "introvert corner" with the cars/car mat (no surprise there), but he also went outside and ran around for a while with the ride-on firetruck and played chalk with his friends. At one point, Isla was on the firetruck and he ran up to her and said, "Isla!!! Chase me!!!" And took off. Love seeing him be his own little person. He also ate more veggie straws than I can count, and clearly more than the 1 cupcake I gave him based on his sugar high when we got home. I decided not to worry about what he ate yesterday. "Fruits and veggies can come tomorrow, today is for fun." Good choice, fun mom! Hahaha. 

We served burgers, hot dogs and caesar salad for dinner. My parents were so so helpful getting the food ready and I could not be more grateful! During all the party prep David kept the kids out of my hair which is more helpful than hands-on help would have been at that point. Also a lot of people stuck around afterwards to help take down, and I'm super appreciative! 

Advantages of being a stay at home mom - time to make cute pompoms! I feel a little guilt because for Dom's first birthday I didn't even think to buy balloons until my mom mentioned decorating the day of... Also I feel bad for him that his birthday parties will always be indoors and hers was just so beautiful. Although, I have a December birthday and never felt like I was missing out!

Monthly photos! Don't even mention the one landscape photo... I've beat myself up about that all day! Haha

Dom went to bed saying/singing, "Happy happy happy birthday Emilia! From Daddy, and Dom, and Mommy!"

When your husband does architectural photography for a living...

As you can see, Dom is not about to catch this ball haha.

In hindsight we should have done this photo not in the direct sun. I was just being a drill sergeant trying to get one taken! 

Baby corner on the picnic blankets!

Where Dom spent 85% of the time. He did so well sharing his toys with all his friends. He seemed so proud <3

Seriously couldn't have been more perfect. Big room, big patio, big lawn!

Big kids playing with the balls!

My mom suggested I sunscreen before hand, so I actually brought some sunscreen for adults and babies just in case! Glad I did, except near the end of the party Emilia cried for a minute and sunscreen ran into her eyes. Poor thing!

And then the cupcake! I gave her one, and she poked at the icing. Forgot to ask someone to take a picture with the camera of us/her blowing out the candle. Nuts!

Got her a plate and she immediately dumped it icing-down on the pavement.

Oops. One cupcake gone before I could get a photo of the #1.

I am so not ashamed to admit these were made with box cake mix and container icing that I colored pink. I still baked it and put it all together, but baking is definitely not where I put my time or effort. I'm all about the little details; not the big ones like cakes apparently haha!

She proceeded to pick the icing off the pavement before getting back to the cupcake. How nice that Dom went to join her though.

This. Face. This is what first cupcake moments are made for!

Fiiinally got into the actual cupcake instead of the icing! What a difference from Dom?! At Dom's first birthday party, he ate his cupcake in two bites. SMASH SMASH! Gone. People were shocked, but I didn't know any different. Now that I see a more "normal" baby way of eating I get it... that was impressive, Dom. 

Another difference in their personalities; she actually really enjoyed and engaged with opening gifts.

She pulled her new teddy bear out of the bag and just squealed and talked to it and smiled and hugged and kissed it. It was so. so. so. cute. I wish I could have seen her face during that part from the other side!

She got some special snacks she won't have to share with Dom, lots of adorable summer clothes which will come in handy this week with the amazing weather, a teddy bear, a book, and a zoo pass! I am so excited to go to the zoo whenever we want!! 

Thank you, Scott for taking these photos!

Bo bo moma came along to represent the great-grandparents. I love your bright outfit, Oma! And the kids were loving your walker. One little girl, Jaia (in previous photo), walked up to it and told her mommy, "Mommy, I want it."

It warmed my heart to see all the kids having fun and not bugging their parents that they were bored. That was super important to me. Or if they did, I didn't notice which is equally as much of a success haha! 

Thank you, Ashleigh, for giving some of your time to the kids and helping out us parents!

Dave says, "I didn't know we were filming a Matrix reboot!"

And because we all know I can't just have a photo and not post it on here, here are some phone photos as well. I have a hoarding problem, but thankfully it's not (usually) with stuff stuff. It's with digital pictures. Whew! My pictures are my Monica's closet from Friends!

She loved this card from Bo Bo Moma. It had a colorful cake with one candle on the front. She chatted away and showed it to us all.

Still holding onto that teddy bear. I asked Dom later what we should name the bear and he thought long and hard and said, "glilly bear" - translation: "Grizzly Bear". His creativity is about as good as mine haha.

This is the same dress that Jaia wore for her first birthday party. It was handed down to us from Janine, and is the most fancy party dress we have now, so of course Emilia wore it on her first birthday! I had every intention of having it on for photos and then changing her into a romper with the same color palette, but she did so well in the dress I just went for it! She couldn't crawl at all, but thankfully she walks, and when she tripped we just stood her back up!

Mmm... pavement cupcake

Stephanie recruiting Henry's help pushing Elliot up the hill on the firetruck. The kids loved that firetruck; it was a Christmas gift for Dom from Allana and Gabriel and has gotten tons of use!

Randomly caught a moment of the three-generations of boys. We have to get a real photo of this, because I think the only other one I have is from Father's Day two years ago.

That's the one.

I put out lots of stuff for the kids to play with, but was still nervous they'd be bored! Inside we had the car mat, cars and dump truck. Outside I had bubbles, chalk, balls, firetruck, wooden blocks/train, and megablocks.

How did we get so lucky?!

Testing out the cupcake 1.