Evie is One in a Melon

And just like that, our girl is one.  Holy smokes.  We did a little family party with Hops takeout, a vanilla cupcake, and a gift from Willa.  Evie was thrilled with all of the above!

I have been looking forward to planning a summer kid's birthday party since I found out I was due in July.  All my favorite party activities take place outside, and I had so many ideas!

I decided to try to keep things on the simpler side, and I truly feel like I did.  Most everything I used was borrowed from friends or something I already had.  I only served three food items, one of which I bought, and one of which was already made.  Decorations were minimal, but we spent most of our time outside.

Watermelon candies!

I borrowed a bounce castle from another mom, such a score!

Super cute cake from Delicious, complete with homemade cake topper

A little bulldog cameo since our nickname for Evie is "Evie-bulldog"

Watermelon lemonade

We borrowed a pool from a friend, and added some watermelon themed inflatables

To incorporate at least one game we decided to do a watermelon eating contest.  We divided the competition into an adult and a kids heat.  Blake, as the oldest kid, won his easily.  As a surprise, he decided to join the adults and narrowly lost that one!  Jeremy was the victor in that one :-).

I must say, we had an awesome group of friends come out to celebrate.  Evie is one lucky kid to have so many awesome people to grow up with!

The big splurge was hiring our favorite ice cream truck, the Ice Queen, to come by the house.  It was surprisingly affordable, especially since we didn't really spend that much elsewhere.  The minimum amount of ice cream we would be charged for was 20 sandwiches, and since there were only nine of us, we all got to have at least two things.  It was awesome.

When it was cake time, I fully expected Evie to love every bite.  She is a voracious eater and got to try a cupcake on her actual birthday, which she loved.  To my surprise, she was not really a fan.  The icing had melted somewhat and was rather thick, so perhaps the texture threw her off?  Either way she had more fun finger painting with the icing than eating the cake itself, which made for interesting pictures!

These last pictures are from the watermelon photo shoot I did for invites and thank you notes.  I used the watermelon beach balls that I gave out as favors and one real one that we enjoyed at dinner later that night.  They turned out so cute!

Such a fun day celebrating our sweet one!

Love Grows baby shower

On March 17 I had the privilege of helping to throw a baby shower for my sister-in-law Katie and her dude, Sahil.  Since it was in the spring I thought a "Love Grows" baby shower would be the best theme, given how many beautiful flowers would be in bloom.  From there I had fun finding greenery garlands, straws that look like birch trees, and seed growing kits for favors.  Katie's friend Jen made a beautiful centerpiece out of washcloth flowers, and we did a vegetarian spread with lots of fresh veggies.  Mix in lots of good friends, and it was an awesome day!

Easter 2018

So, I have a lot of holiday posts to catch up on.  I will do my best in the next couple of days to upload pictures of Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas, but while it's fresh in my mind I figured I would document Easter.

My parents and brother came to visit for a long weekend, which was awesome.  We got to enjoy the holiday at our church AND spend time with family!  Willa loved seeing her grandparents, and we loved being able to send her downstairs in the morning to spend time with the only other morning person in the family (thanks, Papa!).  At one point, Willa reflected, "Papa is such a nice guy, I just love him so much!"  Makes my heart so happy <3.

Admittedly, I went a little overboard in the basket department.  I have been accumulating things for a while, and I think I just forgot about all the things I had gotten.  So even the bigger basket I bought was a little overstuffed!  But she took the time to appreciate every little thing.  My parents also got her a science kit and a Paw Patrol Leapstart book for our smart girl.  She was thrilled.

Evie spent the day as she spends most days, smiling and waving at everyone with those blue eyes and that dimple!  She was very popular indeed.  Willa helped her open her basket; she was very excited to share the holiday with her baby sister.

Willa was great at the egg hunt, and just like last year she got a decent number of eggs, then declared, "I have plenty!"  I was very proud that she can moderate herself :).

Here are some pictures from the day.  I especially like Evie as a sad bunny, complete with nose bubble!

Here are the videos of the (failed) follow the string activity to lead Willa to her basket, and Willa helping Evie to open her basket.

Happy Easter, everyone!