Fairy and Dragon 5th Birthday Party!

My daughter turned 5 years old, which is so awesome and totally crazy at the same time! I just can't believe she is already 5 and in kindergarten.  These 5 years have really flown by, and it makes me really realize how fast life really goes. I have such mixed emotions of excitement for the future, and sadness at realizing she isnt a baby anymore and that she is growing way too fast!

We of course had to have a big celebration for her, and decided on a fairy dragon party. If you can't tell by now, I am slightly obsessed with children's parties; I just love doing something fun and special for my kids!

 When each girl arrived she got to pick out her fairy wings, birthday tutu and fairy wand! The boys were dragons and got fun dragon capes.

 Her fun candy buffet for the party!

 Appetizers included, strawberries, chocolate dipped marshmallow pops, individual vegetable cups, dark chocolate pretzels and chocolate covered frozen bananas! Then for dinner we served bbq chicken, mac n cheese and mashed potatoes and rolls. I always think party food makes it more fun for the adults!

 The girls got to decorate their fairy houses. I also made the ribbon topiaries and the table cloth  to complete the look.

 We also made the boys dragon capes, and they got to decorate their own dragon.

 And finally the party begins!

 A real fairy even joined in on the celebration!

 Each party guest got to have their face painted by the fairy!

 My little guy playing and trying to get his sticky candy hands all over my dad.

 The girls getting their cute tattoos

 "Ring around the rosey and we all fall DOWN!"

And of course our only family photo includes the fairy...

I think everyone had a great time at the party, and most importantly my daughter loved it! The fairy was a huge hit and all the kids got to get their face painted and cool balloon animals. I also had her pass out fairy dust and dragon eggs we made. The fairy stayed in character all night long, even at the end after all the kids left we couldn't break her from her character. For instance my mom asked her where she learned to face paint and she said (in her fairy voice) "My fairy godmother taught me" and I later told her to please help herself to the candy bar and cake and she said "Sure my prince charming does love his sweets", which I guess is good, but also just funny. So anyways it was amazing and I am so happy we had such a great party to celebrate my sweet, beautiful and wonderful little girl that lights up my life.

Summer time!

I have not blogged in SO long.  So rather than give a lengthy update on my life I'm just going to do it through pictures! : )

My sweet pumpkin graduated preschool.

 We went to Utah and had a fun time with friends!

 Our kids enjoyed visits with their grand parents!

 Loving the summertime weather!

And we  had a really great 2 week vacation




Oh ya wait, we also went to San Diego...

That was um...interesting? Yes lets just say interesting..




 Here we are at Sea World!

 Don't I look thrilled???! More like "Put the camera down and help with our crazy children!"

Well yes 2 days in lovely San Diego was too long for us! After our thrilling Sea World experience with our very loud little toddler boy we forfeited our 2nd night stay at our hotel and hightailed it back to our family's house before ending our trip and coming home!

Well at least most of our trip went smoothly! (please disregard the last two unflattering photos of myself and my perfect kids ; ))!

Carmel Getaway

One of my favorite weekend getaways has to be Carmel. Its absolutely beautiful and so relaxing. My family would go to Carmel-by-the-sea all the time when I was little, so it brings back great memories. Everything seems to stay pretty much the same in Carmel, from the stores to the restaurants which makes it even that much more special. Its also so fun to make that quick little drive over to Monterey and enjoy the wharf and the Monterey Bay Aquarium. It is definitely a special place for our family now too.

Fruit and Vegetable Garden

Easter weekend we made a vegetable and fruit garden in our backyard with planters boxes. We planted carrots, broccoli, leafy greens, green onions, lots of strawberries, squash and pumpkin. We also have  around our backyard a lemon tree, an orange tree, a tomato plant, a blubbery plant and a raspberry plant. We should just be farmers! Seriously though, I just got back from Whole Foods and paid 5.99 each for little boxes of strawberries, blueberries and raspberries, so I will be so happy when we can just pick our own in our backyard. I've started to really feel guilty we haven't been eating much organic produce and so we're finally making the change. Even though its more expensive I think its worth it.

Both our kids LOVE to be outdoors, so they love checking on how our fruits and veggies are growing!

We also released the butterflies we have had since our little boy's first birthday party. We watched them grow from little caterpillars to big butterflies which was pretty fun! 

Fun at the Park

Our weekend was a mix of fun and not so fun. Saturday it was pouring rain, and there's really not much to do on those days besides clean the house, which is obviously not so fun! But Sunday was beautiful and sunny. My daughter had a friends birthday party to go to in the morning, and she had so much fun running around with her friends and getting her face painted. Afterwards we spent some good quality family time walking through the nature preserve to our local park. It really was such a fun day. At the park we even saw a goldendoodle dog, which my daughter loved. It almost made me want to consider getting a dog for our family..almost!

See how beautiful it was out?! And our little boy with his cute hat on that makes him look so much older!

She loved her butterfly face, and insisted that her daddy play with her the whole time we were at the park!

He could NOT handle the goldendoodle dog at the park. He kept pointing and says "Ooohh" until I finally walked him over to the dog to say hi. 

We ended our weekend having dinner at our favorite neighbors house and played a fun game of Cranium.

Winter Wonderland!

Yes I know it's technically not winter anymore, but it is just starting to feel like winter here! Finally the rain and cold have come! This weekend we went away to the snow and it was so much fun. First we visited my aunt and uncle and had a great time with them. They live near a great ski resort so it made it that much more fun to enjoy the mountain with them. Then after a couple days we headed to another ski resort location and stayed there for a couple days. Our daughter enjoyed ski school, tubing and playing in the snow. It was really fun to get away with the family and just enjoy life!  

Our first day of snow fun!

Snow loving baby. He had to do everything his big sister was doing and insisted on being in the snow too!

Unfortunately I can't get any of our other pictures to load. It was lots of fun and I think we're going to make this an annual trip since our little ones seem to LOVE the snow! : )

The Very Hungry Caterpillar First Birthday

My little baby boy is already a year old! I am happy and sad all at the same time. Happy of course because he is such a joy, and I am so unbelievably lucky to have such a sweet, loving and healthy little boy. And sad only because time flies by way too fast. I really can not believe it has already been a year since he was born. He brings me such happiness, and I don't go a day without laughing and smiling because of him and his big sister. 

For his first birthday party, we spent the day celebrating with family and friends. I was so happy that my family flew up for the weekend to celebrate with us, and it really made the party that much more special.

The party was themed after the book "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" by Eric Carle, and it was so much fun! All the planning and preparation paid off and I was so happy with the result. 

My husband and I made his name blocks by first spray painting them a nice blue color. We then modge podged on pages from the book "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" onto the wooden blocks. The the vinyl letters were cut out by my friend's Cricut.
We also put together pictures from each month of his first year for his banner.
For the jars we added peanut M&M's and regular M&M's, a number one birthday candle, and attached balloons to it. We made a few of them and used them as table center pieces, and on the mantel as well.

My husband and I also made the "Happy Birthday" banner which was pretty easy. We then prepared different foods from the book that we thought people would enjoy. They were a total hit and worked perfect as appetizers before we served lunch.  We also made grapes and strawberries on skewers that went on the red box, although they were not done before I started taking pictures, oops!

Of course I can't not mention his AMAZING cake. The lady that made his cakes is so unbelievably talented and wonderful to work with, I am recommending her to everyone. He also had his own smash cake that was in the shape of an apple you can see in the other pictures above!

I just had to add this picture because he is such a goofball and he loves balloons. We actually ordered this balloon by accident but I actually think it added to the theme to have the butterfly balloon on his high chair, since obviously he was our little caterpillar all year that has turned into our beautiful little butterfly : )

I set up a craft table and had the kids make handprint caterpillar that I think they enjoyed. I made my daughter make one beforehand and framed it so everyone could see an example of what they could do if they wanted.
We also had a slideshow of pictures from his first year running on the tv. That was really fun to make and totally made me realize how big our little man has grown over this past year. It was fun to find all our favorite songs too to go along with it.
After we had lunch the kids went on a "Caterpillar Hunt". We created fun clues that had them running all over the house. At the end of the hunt they found their own real live caterpillars. We bought them each a live butterfly garden from Insect Lore. So they can actually see their own caterpillars turn into butterflies in a few weeks. My husband 'loved' that I pushed for this, but I actually thought it was fun having 35 caterpillar larvae in our house for a few days before the party : )!

My little love bug getting ready for his cake! We made him his party hat. He actually loved it!

Yum yum!

Here are the kids party favors. They are fun little pretend caterpillars, food shaped erasers, bubbles and a puzzle. Even with the live caterpillars, they also had to have fun toys!

Happy Birthday to my little love bug!

I love you my little one year old!