My baby is growing up way to fast! It feels like she was born just a few weeks ago, how in the world is she five already?!

Our birthday balloon photos on the party day are quickly become my favorite birthday tradition. Fortunately this kid is still happy to obliged by crazy momtographer tendencies. Put on a party dress for photos? Sure. Do it again with a different pair of sunglasses? No problem! She even enjoys coming up with her own poses.

Yesterday we had a small party for family with a helium balloons and princess cake. As always, the cake was a bit of a swing and a miss. Both kids enjoyed looking at the cake and were excited for a piece, but both kids also only picked at their piece before asking to get down from the table, or requested goldfish and pretzels to eat instead. Both kids will eat angle cake well, but they just don’t get excited for it the way they do the character cakes which makes me reluctant to serve it on their birthdays. Ah well, birthday dilemma.

Afterward the family party we went to a restaurant where Nicole got a special birthday dessert. She was so excited for her birthday restaurant and birthday desert that she told both the hostess who sat us and our sever (several times) that it was her birthday. On the way out the hostess remembered us and wished Nicole a happy birthday for the second time. She loves her birthday attention.

The kid party will be next weekend. We’re having a low key art party. I bought a whole bunch of art supplies: canvas, sun catchers, beads and the like. I haven’t gotten many RSVPs yet, but Nicole’s closest friends did RSVP in the affirmative. Nicole will be super happy, even if they’re the only ones that are able to make it. Since neither Alexis nor Nicole are really big on frosting, we’re considering getting an ice cream cake for her kid party.

Nicole is bringing in frosted cookies for school tomorrow. I learned my lesson last year about bringing homemade stuff. We set some aside some cookies for Alexis, just in case she isn’t able to join Nicole’s class for treat time. (Their school usually lets them visit each other’s classrooms when we bring in a treat, but you never know what will actually happen the day of.)

All in all I think this birthday is a little more low-key than last one, but no less fun. The addition of a restaurant dinner was a big heat, and she’s really looking forward to the planned activities at her kids’ party.

Someone is having a good birthday party, day? week? fortnight?!

When each of the girls was born near a major US holiday (Independence day for Nicki, Thanksgiving for Alexis) I was stoked. Having a birthday near a major holiday meant having an extended weekend for the party. Our family is spread out over both costs, so an extra travel day is most definitely an asset. It turns out having a birthday near a major holiday tends to draw out the festivities.

The birthday celebration started off with a school party on the 1st. Grandma and Grandpa were flying in on the 2nd. We like to keep the girls out of school for the week Grandma and Grandpa visit to maximize everyone’s time together. That meant cupcake day at school would have to be the 1st.

Who forgot about the school’s no home good policy? This girl! After making two dozen cupcake ice cream cones, fashioning an ice cream cone holder out of an amazon prime shipping box and some how managing to get them all to school relatively in tact I learned the kids would not be able to eat them. There are a couple kids with food allergies in Nicole’s class and even though the cupcakes didn’t have any nuts, the school didn’t want to take chances. I can understand that, it’s their liability after all. Thankfully there was a shop that sold cupcakes near by. When parents arrived at the end of the day they had the option give their child one of the home made cupcakes, so most of the kids got two different cupcakes.

That’s not the only thing we had double of do to a Mommy Mistake. Who ordered the wrong sized bike? This girl! I ordered Nicole a 12 inch balance bike. I thought it might be a little small, but doable since she’s on the shorter side. No dice, and now that it was put together I couldn’t return it. Domingo and I made a quick trip to Target where the only bike in her size was a frozen bike with optional sleigh doll carrier. Nicole was most definitely not disappointment about that.

On Saturday, when most of her friends had returned from their holiday travels, we had our first ever birthday party with just friends. That’s two sets of cupcakes at school, two bikes (now one for Alexis) and two parties, stretched out over two weeks. Fourpalooza for sure.

Since this was our first year having a birthday party with friends from school we had a few lesson learns:

– Write your own invitations. Computer printing is far more legible than my chicken scratch, and we can easily create the number we need. The invitations we bought came in an 8 pack which was inconvenient given there were 17 kids invited, and didn’t have enough space to write “siblings welcomed.”

– Buy Cupcakes/Cakes. Seriously, when will I learn? Our local grocery store charges the same price for the customized cakes as they do for the generic cakes in the bakery refrigerator, and they’re good, really really good.

– Do not fear Chucky Cheese. I dreaded our friend party. I remembered Chucky cheese as loud, with obnoxious
animations, but it’s really improved since I was a kid. We were assigned a party coordinator who was fantastic. Speaking of which, I need to go call them and let them know what a wonderful job our party coordinator did!

And just like that another year has passed.

I can’t believe how fast time is flying, or how big my little girl is getting.

This year we thought it would be fun to kick off her birthday party with a big surprised. She loves balloons, so what better way to celebrate the big ‘3’ than waking up with a 3 foot high helium balloon? Before going to sleep ourselves, we snuck the giant balloon into her room. Wouldn’t you know it was the first night in weeks she woke up to go potty in the middle of the night? She spotted the balloon instantly and was so excited I was afraid she’d never go back to sleep. She kept talking about the balloon that ‘Santa’ brought. We decided to just go with it. Santa brings birthday balloons now, don’t you know?

So much has changed these past couple of months. New home, new daycare, new classroom, new routines. Nicole missed her old daycare (and told us so!) but is adjusting to the new one well. They have a ton of activities, and bouncy castles. We’ve been here about a month and they’ve already bounced in an inflatable bouncy castle twice. I’m not planning on switching daycares any time soon, but if I were, bouncy castles are clearly a new requirement.

My most precious memory of this age is the way she expresses herself. For the longest time ‘Sure’ was her affirmative response to yes/no questions. “Would you like a cupcake?” Sure, she’d say with a slight head nod as though her answer was anything less than an emphatic yes. These days ‘little bit’ is her new yes. As in “Are you the cutest thing ever?” Little bit. Little bit, indeed.

It has not been two years. I refuse to believe.

Yesterday was Nicki’s birthday party. It was a pretty low key affair, a few relatives, balloons, a dinner out, and a birthday cake. The initial plan was to go to the park in the morning, and Domingo and I would setup for the party while she napped. We’d open presents and go to an old fashioned dinner across the street for dinner (a place Nicki loves), then have cake.

Instead I ended up with a migraine. We (well, mostly Nicole) boogied to sesame street videos in the morning since I did not have the energy to make it off the couch. We both napped, leaving Domingo – super dad! – to get ready for the party. I was hoping to nap longer but Lily – who is not my favorite feline right now – felt the need to dig me out of the covers a half hour or so after finally falling asleep. By then even if I was able to fall asleep again quickly, it wouldn’t be a quality nap, so I decided to try and make do without. I didn’t want to cancel Nicki’s birthday party. I was already feeling guilty it wouldn’t measure up to last year’s. Besides, there was no guarantee I’d be feeling better if we did reschedule.

As miserable as I was Nicki had a blast, and that’s the important thing. She had grand time chasing the balloons, adored spending time with the family, loved the restaurant and devoured her cake. She even blew out the candle all by herself! Since she was having so much fun with her grandparents we let her stay up a bit past her bedtime. Once she was asleep, I made a bee line for my own bed. Thirteen hours in bed later and I was finally doing better.