Monster Party and the Birthday Boy

Yeah, yeah....I'm a little late updating you about the birthday party!  Many of you that read the blog were there so I felt OK about delaying on posting while our busy life carried on this week.

We spent most of Saturday morning rushing around.  I'm glad that we stayed so busy because every time there was a quiet moment, I'd get weepy about my little boy making it through this tough year.  (Geez, what a girl I've become.)

I found that it's really hard to make decorations and put them up while taking care of a baby at the same time.  Thankfully, I had a few people helping: my mom, Michael, and Jessica....my sister in law.  I even put Carolyn Albright (Samuel's primary nurse at ACH) to work making pigs-in-a-blanket.  In the end, all of the stress was worth it.  His party was great and we had a rather large turn-out (about 60 people!)  I was a little concerned about how Samuel would handle being around so much noise and so many people - but as usual, he surprised me.  He had a few little uneasy/crying/fussing spells at the beginning but by the end he was eating up all of the attention.

The invitations were two-sided.  In the picture above, the front of the invitation is to the right.  The back of the invitation was just a picture.  I made them in Photoshop and used Vistaprint to print them.  I got the idea from Ryan Pickle who made her son's invitations the same way.  As I whole, I was pretty happy with them.  Next time I will pay a little extra to give them a glossy finish instead matte.

 

This picture really doesn't do the cupcakes justice.  I didn't have enough time to organize them in a pretty way.  They were REALLY cute.  I decided to skip on the fondant icing....after all, butter cream icing tastes FAR better.  If you think that I'm good enough to make them, you are wrong!  NO ONE can make cakes/cupcakes like Creative Kitchen.  We used them for our wedding cake almost 3 years ago (which was also fabulous.)  I love their icing....it tastes almondy.  Yes, I know that's not a word.

Monster Munch (Chex Mix)

Monster Eyes (meatballs), Monster Toes (Pigs in a Blanket), Monster Fingers (Chicken Strips)

I had Jessica make the tissue paper pom-poms. The words hanging from them are "Omm, Num, Num" (the way a monster sounds when he eats.)

I displayed pictures of Samuel (birth to present) on the door.

sign by the road

welcome sign

birthday banner

This was probably my favorite part of the party (even though I didn't get outside to see it in-use.) My parents made this bean bag toss for the kids to play. It kept them happy and kept them away from Samuel - since it's still cold and flu season.

 

I was really pleased with how everything turned out.  I should have made more decorations (my parents house is so big that it didn't look like we had made much) but what we did make, I was happy with.

My favorite gifts were a sock monkey that Christie Martin made him, a necklace with Samuel's name stamped on it made by Angie Bryant (of course, that was really a gift for me wasn't it?  haha), and some dress shoes that my mom ordered him.

More news to share about what's been going on the last two weeks....but it's going to have to wait until the next post!