Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Gabriel's 1st Birthday Continued...

The Cake...

I can hardly believe my little baby is ONE!!! Here are some pictures of him enjoying his first birthday cake! You'll see he definitely enjoyed it!!! I had to scrub our bathtub clean after his bath!


Not sure what to do... Mommy was a little nervous with the candle in front of him!!!

Hmmmm... what happens when I put my fingers here...



And put them into my mouth...
Still not sure...
And then he figured it out...
MMMMM.... this is yummy!!!


Ya want some???
Nahhhhh.... I was just kiddin'! I waited a whole year for this cake!!!
Only Daddy can have some!
"Daddy's great! He gave me chocolate cake!!! "
Here Daddy eat some!

On his way up to the bathtub!
What???? Do I have something on my face?
Now how am I going to hide this from Mommy???

Monday, March 26, 2012

Gabriel's 1st Birthday!






Turning ONE Seuss style!

I'm going to do this blog in a couple of sections! The first blog I'm going to show some decor for the party! I had so much fun planning Gabe's birthday party. I was going back and forth between a few different themes including Dr. Seuss, Cowboys, and Elmo. I chose Dr. Seuss because we ALL know the first birthday party is really for US. Those cute little one year olds aren't going to remember ANYTHING!

I started by scouring stores for any Seuss items... ummmm nothing. So then I started spending hours at night looking on the internet. I found some cute ideas from various blogs and incorporated some of those ideas with some of my own. It took me a couple of months to organize my ideas and to purchase the items I wanted. Once I got started it was so fun and there are so many ideas out there for Dr. Seuss birthdays! I knew we were going to have a lot of little kids running around so I decided on kid friendly foods like PBJ sandwiches, turkey roll sandwiches, and croissant sandwiches. I also knew fruit would be a big hit so we did fruit skewers. Other food included mozzarella sticks, chips/dip, goldfish, pretzels, deviled eggs, ham/cream cheese rolls, chicken nuggets & macaroni and cheese. Of course all of these were labeled with Seuss names. We had a dessert table with apothecary jars, martini glasses, and margarita glasses filled with different kinds of candy, cupcakes, cake pops, and of course a birthday cake and smash cake for the guest of honor!

In our dining room we set-up the gift table and a couple of kids tables with various activities for the kids to do. I had printed off coloring pages from PBS.com, purchased a LORAX activitiy book and had a few books sitting out.

When guests first arrived we had a little "photo booth" set-up so guests could take pictures with a polaroid camera. I had a scrap book sitting on an adjacent table so guests could place their pictures on a scrapbook page and decorate it with stickers, their pictures, and a little note for Gabriel. I think this was a huge hit!

We also had a Dr. Seuss jump house that is, of course, always a huge hit with kids.

Overall, we had a blast!

Tomorrow I will post some pictures of Gabe and his cake!

Our courtyard set-up with tables and chairs.... I had so much fun making these centerpieces!!!
The centerpieces are just cardboard boxes wrapped (I added some soup cans so they didn't blow over) and the buckets were stuffed with styrofoam, shredded paper, rainbow swirl suckers, pinwheels, and faux flowers in the middle... There was so much more I wanted to do with them but my printer went kaput a couple of nights before the party! :-(


The dessert table... swedish fish (One fish, two fish, red fish, blue fish), Our topsy turvy cake, Chewy sprees (Sally's sweets), cake pops (Thing 1 & Thing 2), smash cake, Happy Birthday cupcakes, M&M's (beezlenuts), gumballs that looked like seeds (Truffula seeds)...





The food table...
Various kinds of sandwiches (Who Roast-Beast)
PBJ sandwiches (sneetch treats)
Macaroni & Cheese (Cat's Mac & Cheese)
Chicken Nuggets (Nupboards Nuggets)
Fruit Skewers (Truffula Fruits)
Goldfish in a pitcher because I don't own a teapot (Fish in a Teapot)
Ham rollups & Deviled Eggs (Green Eggs & Ham)
Schlottz's Knots (pretzels)
Biggel Balls (mozzarella sticks... I was supposed to cut them in to tiny pieces, but ran out of time)





The entry table with sign asking people to sign the book with their picture from the photobooth
Entry table with items to decorate the scrapbook

Present table with activity tables
Noah and Gabriel wore these shirts...


MC helping me decorate! She was a HUGE help!!! Thank you so much!


The birthday banner that we made... We bought the template off of etsy.com and printed it and strung it on ribbon... It turned out great!


AND a few pictures of a few guests takin' pictures for our scrapbook... It turned out really cute!!! I guess I should have made the paper strips a little bigger!!!









Thursday, March 15, 2012

Cooking with Noah


I was going through my pictures from Disneyland and had forgotten that I took a bunch of pictures one morning as I made "homemade" cookies with the boys. (Don't judge me... they are made in my home... nestle just helped with the batter) Noah loved breaking the cookies apart and placing them on the cookie sheets AND let's not forget that these had cars on them too! We had some fun...


Carefully placing the cookies on the cookie sheet...

Almost ready to put in the oven...


When I wasn't looking Noah put a cookie on Gabe's tray... can't you just imagine what he's thinking here... "I can't believe you've been keeping THIS from me!!!"

"what??? I don't know how he got that cookie!"
Waiting for his cookies to finish... Don't worry it doesn't get hot... He's not walking around with a burn on his forehead...




Sunday, March 11, 2012

Disneyland

Over the last couple of months we have been planning a trip to Disneyland. Corey and Chaudy were taking the girls for their birthdays so we decided to join them. Grandma Coco, Uncle Sean, Aunt Be, and Maura all visited the Magical Kingdom too!

We had a blast! At first I was a little hesitant to take the boys. I really didn't realize how much there is to do with toddlers. I pictured our family wandering around Disneyland on a hot day pushing crying babies in the stroller. Sounds fun doesn't it. Instead we were running from ride to ride and enjoying the boys' smiles. They loved the carousels, Autopia (does this surprise anybody??? Noah was in heaven!), Monsters Inc., It's a small world and so much more! At the end of each day we were there the boys were passed out in the stroller and slept like rocks through the night! Mommy and Daddy were sore for days! They loved it so much we are considering buying annual passes!



Noah and Maura takin' a break
Gabriel and Daddy waiting for Nemo submarine...


Noah inside the submarine with Cheira, Cadi, and Auntie Chaudra
Noah and Gabe looking out the windows...
Driving on Autopia

Daddy and Noah
Uncle Corey, Cadi, and Cheira
I don't think I need to explain this picture...
We went to a lunch where Cadi and Cheira were able to meet several of the princesses


Noah was promised a sucker if he made it through the lunch... LOL... he made it.
Grandma Coco and Gabey on the carosoul




This was our second day at Disney. It was 80+ degrees
What a 2 year old looks two days in to a Disneyland trip when it is H-O-T outside!
Playing in the water in Bug's Land
Family photo... Don't mind the Disney photographer on the right... lol
It's a small world