I LOVE birthdays, and celebrating your child’s birthday just makes it all the better if you ask me! I have had Jayden’s birthday party for this year all planned for months now. Ben kept telling me how great it was that I was so excited about it, but that I should probably focus on my own birthday since it was first, but where is the fun in that now that I have a cute little guy to throw fun parties for?
Enough about his party for this year that has not even happened ye,t and on to his birthday last year. By the way, guess what that means? I have less than a year until I am all the way caught up with our new blog! Yay!!! Not bad considering I started back in 2005 just this past February. Covering eight years in just six months with all the pictures I take is definitely something to be proud of! Okay, back to the task at hand…
Jayden’s birthday party last year was a hit! We threw it at my parent’s house and invited all of my family, Ben’parents and siblings still living at home, and my grandparents. We did a jungle animal theme and my sister Cami made the most fabulous cakes I have ever seen as her gift to him. We are sure going to miss having her around this year since she will be serving her mission in Oregon, but I am going to take over the cake decorating (for this year anyway). I went shopping a week before with one of my best friend’s (Kyle Bybee’s) mother for a little girl’s day and got some decorations at Zurchers. I was pretty disappointed with their not-so-cute jungle animal themed décor, so I went in another direction for that. All-in-all I think it turned out great and we spent under $10 to make it all come together. We used most of the money we had been saving, to get him a little radio flyer to ride around, a ball, some bubbles (he LOVES them!), and a little beginner’s laptop. He LOVED his gifts! So much in fact, that he kissed each and every one of them. Everyone thought it was so adorable. I have never experienced so much laughter and joy at a party before, and that is saying something, my friends.
This lucky guy got two cakes, a family one, a personal one, and cupcakes! I think his Auntie Cami is a little fond of him. ;)
So, as I said, the décor was not jungle themed, but at least it was cute!
We let the kids help put balloons up-EVERYWHERE! We had a ton, and we used them all!
We all enjoyed a nice dinner outside before presents and cake and ice cream.
I had really hoped that we would have a walker by his first birthday since he had been walking along walls and with the support of things for months at this point in time, but this little guy is quite the perfectionist (I wonder where he gets that from) ;), and he waited until he was sure he was ready. The good thing about that? We never dealt with the “fall down every other step phase”. Once he started walking, he just had it down pact!
Jayden had so much fun playing with the wrapped gifts, wrapping paper, and packaging. Typical child, right parents?
If the grin on his face did not solidify his liking of this particular gift, the kiss he gave it did!
Card, adorable outfit, and chocolate bar from Great Grandma Ahlstrom
The stuffed alligator that Uncle Jared got for him.
The children’s book our Japanese foreign exchange student brought him from Japan. He LOVES it! To this day it is one of his favorites! Not that Mommy can read a word of it, but he likes the pictures of the dog, cat, and chick, and especially loves the baby he sees in the mirror at the end.
He was excited about his laptop and once again gave a gift a cute little kiss.
We were going to let him eat the big lion cake, but decided to do a little lion cupcake instead. Good thing we did because he still wasted most of that. He did not know what to think at first and does not like having his hands messy, but he warmed up to the experience rather quickly.
The cutest pictures I got were with my phone, so I just had to cheat and share a few of those now rather than wait for my mobile pic post.
By far Jayden’s favorite festivity of the day, was playing with all the balloons with his aunts and uncles. There was non-stop squealing and giggling coming from my sisters’ room.
My Mom got a little bit busy with everything going on and about died when she realized she forgot to get Jayden’s presents, so a few days later, my family came to visit and brought the gifts. It all worked out! I mean why have just one day of presents when you can have two, right? They got him an adorable key and cell phone toy kit and a little kitchen. He went crazy for them!
I could not believe he was already one, and now here we are with him turning 2 (!) in exactly one month from today! CRAZY!
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