A Two year old's Birthday- WOW the Excitement!

The older I get the more I realize I am like my mother. YIKES! (I will get back to that in a moment) As I am thinking to write this post I am remembering the trials of the past weekend more than when they were actually happening. I am not a dramatic person so I roll with the punches and don't let myself get too stressed out.

Anytimg I throw a party or have people over I alsways try to outdo myself. I usually think up really cool ideas at the last minute and end up forgetting something important. This year I did try to outdo myself but I really tried not to add anything on at the last minute and resolved that if something I had planned for didn't happen I would do something else.

So for a month I have researched and planned this "two year old's" party down to every detail. I had games to play, favors to give, food to make and a house to clean. Thanks to Jim who did most of the cleaning part. I am solely responsible however to the creative aspects of any party because if it were up to Jim we would order pizza and buy a cake from Costco.

I had decided this year that the theme would be dogs. Ean is obbsessed with dogs and I knew he would get a kick out of the decorations I found at BirthdayExpress.com . I also decided I would not buy a cake this year I would make one, so it could fit the theme. I did not want to buy the little favor boxes they offered on the site so I also made my own. Usually I make the food when people come over instead of purchasing it, since platters and trays can be so expensive.

This is where my mom comes in. Anytime we have a dinner or a get-together I am worried that we will not have enough food. I think that comes from our family dinners where we always had days and days of leftover's because we made so much food. Soooo, I think I had about ten to twelve "appetizers" on my little menu to make. I did scratch some at the last minute when we couldn't fit anymore on the table.

So here is how it went, the weekend before the party I began planning for the food and favors. I went shopping for everything I thought I would need since I wanted to start preparation during the week and knew I wouldn't have time to shop during the week. I got all of the groceries except what wouldn't last for the week and got the stuff for the gift bags. Also, last weekend I made the little favors which were doggy lollipops made of milk and white chocolate. I bought the form and melted the chocolate and everything. I also wrote out all of the menu and activities that would happen.

During the week I just kept reviewing my plans and making sure I wasn't forgetting anything. I also made the sugar cookie dough one morning while Ean was eating breakfast since it has to cool beofre cutting anyway. On saturday I baked all day. I made Ean's cake which was a dog bone and took 5 cakes. So the logistics were frightening. Then I also made dog bone shaped sugar cookies and dipped them in chocolate for more favors. I made and rolled the tortilla appetizers and and boiled the eggs for deviled eggs and egg salad sandwiches. I had to do some adjustments to the favor bags for more kids coming and started to get my decor. organized.

Saturday I thought of a cool idea to print a bunch of pictures of Ean form last year to now and put them on a poster board so everyone could look at it during the party. Like a collage type thing. Of course I don't hardly every print pictures so when I went through to find the pictures there was about a million to print and when I tried to send to Walgreens to have them printed Walgreens system couldn't find them on my computer so since it was midnight and I had given my best effort to this last minute idea I scratched it and moved on. However, it will be top on my list next year! Since everyone was sleeping I decorated the living room and put the little dog stickers on the wall. The banner had to wait until the morning since I needed Jim's help.

Sunday came and in the morning I picked up the balloons I had blown up. I got a few last minute decor. things and as soon as Ean went down for his nap we started our final prep. Jim did most of the food prep. , and I finished the decorations by placing the balloons and streamers around and getting the keepsake table cloth put on the table with the presents from us. I got the games that we were going to play together and set everything up. My dad and Shaunah got there early to help us THANK GOD! and between us all, we made it before people started coming.

The party went great. One of the games we played was the one where you put a piece of paper to each guest's back and they have to guess who or what they are, you usually will be famous people but we did the words Ean could say. So one person was a Hamburger and another person was a bike and another person was a dog bowl etc. That went over pretty good and it got people talking to eachother. We also did the guess how many jelly beans are in a jar, I fit it to the theme by doing brown (root beer) jelly beans and calling them "Doggy Chow".

Ean was pretty good, he didn't have anyone his own age come but he enjoyed playing with the older kids anyway. He got a little overwhelmed at the end but all in all the day went well.

I took a lot of picture so I am attaching a hyperlink to view all of them at my Kodak Gallery