Lego land birthday

This year we decided to offer Nolan to either have a party or invite one friend over to spend the night and that we would go Lego land. Thank goodness he chose Lego land. Don't get me wrong, I love to throw a birthday party but with his party only weeks after Landry, a little break in party planning was nice.

My parents came to watch Landry and we took Nolan, his friend and Campbell to Lego land. I gotta say that I don't understand the fascination with legos, but I do love how much they creativity out in my boys. They could play with them for hours.

I'm not sure who had the most fun out of all my kids...including my biggest one.

My favorite part was seeing the the little Lego towns that looked just like DFW. Way too much. Of course I would love the part that remind me of a doll house.

I gotta say, I'm really sold on this kind of party. I'm hoping we might just be able to talk him into something like this every year.

It's SuperCam!

Superheroes seem to be a reoccurring theme in our house. The kids were superheroes for Halloween last year and the boys wear capes weekly, if not daily.

So it was a no-brainer that Cam would want a superhero party this year. In years past, I've had a cookie monster party at our house...

Last year we had a Kentucky Derby party at church.

They took a lot of work but they were well worth it. Don't even get me started on how long those sock horses took me. I normally have it at home or church because I'm so dang cheap but this year with working two jobs, the thought of planning a party on top of all that just about did me in.

This year, I was a total slacker and just had it at a Trampoline park. I literally showed up with a cake and two table decorations and plates.

But Campbell's cake was crazy cute. I could've just had a party all by myself diving into that thing. A teacher friend made it and it was ridiculously good.

Campbell has talked about this birthday for weeks now. He loved having his friends there to share it with.

And his hair was dripping with sweat by the time we left the party.

Little Bit jumped til her pig tails fell out.

The kids Justin loved every second.

 

 

Ok, so maybe we all had fun. 

I can't believe that my Campbelloni is 5 years old now. Cam gets really shy when everyone sings him Happy Birthday. He loves attention but on his own terms.

So the moral of the story is that my kid couldn't care less where he has his party. He smiles ear to ear just the same. He loves it when we have it at the house, church, or trampoline park. All he cares about is that we're doing something to recognize his birthday and celebrate him.

Sometimes, we have to give ourselves a little slack as parents. I read a quote recently that said, "Behind every great kid is a mom who's pretty sure she's screwing it up." Amen.

Nolan's 7th pARTy

I've been dreaming of this art party for years, long before Pinterest. Of course, Pinterest only fueled the fire and upped the bar to make me feel like I might be the cheapest mom on the planet.

Nevertheless, an art party was made for Nolan, so I was so excited when he said he wanted one. Although on the day of the party, it looked as though our theme was "Noah's Ark" with the torrential downpour that happened all.day.long. There goes the playground idea.

The hard thing about art is that kids either do it in 20 seconds or they take hours, but I think it kept them occupied just long enough. The favors were fun to make and it was the perfect time of year with school supplies. Bonus!

Of course, Justin made the tag that said, "Thanks for making my birthday a masterpiece." The little crayons were actually erasers and I think they were the most excited about those rather than the paint.

Double bonus that the art theme went perfectly with using the same banner and bright colors as Landry's rainbow party. We had another amazing cake that did not disappoint that was created by a speech teacher at my school. She is so talented.

 The kids went nuts when we cut into the cake and they realized it was rainbow colored, perfectly going with our bright paint theme.

I stole the Rice Krispie paint brush idea off Pinterest and the kids loved them. All the letters that were used for the canvases were cut from my Cricut, of course.

 

The easels for their nametags were just popsicle sticks that were already painted from the Dollar Tree that I hot glued together.

 

 I stole the idea of the beret and the mustache from my dear friend, Andrea, who also had an art party for her daughter. See, I'm just full of original ideas, huh? By far, this hat and mustache were the hit of the party to make our masterpiece photos complete.

Once the kids were done painting, we peeled off the stickers to reveal their names in the negative space, a one-of-a-kind masterpiece. 

Although, not all the kids were a fan of the mustache, even sweet baby Blake played along.

Our friends are officially the most wonderful people to get out on such a nasty day to make it to Nolan's birthday. They helped participate in the art party because I definitely needed some parent involvement on this party since there was so much to do. The babies just played and Landry worked on her grocery store feet getting nice and dirty.

 

And these poor girls are just forced to be sisters because there are just too many stinky boys in our families. 

And in perfect McDonald fashion, right when I lit the candles, Nolan bumped into a friend and his front tooth started gushing blood.

We quickly dried up his tears and my Nolie Polie smiled with pride as we sang him "Happy Birthday" and I tried my best to hold it together. 

Next was opening presents and don't worry, Nolan's not angry in the photo below. That is his I'm so happy, I could hug your face off expression.  The beret was a nice touch for the photos, especially with the front tooth gap. 

Priceless.

I pretty much summed it up to be the worst party in the books after our torrential downpour with no kids being able to play on the playground, the front tooth gushing blood, and balloons that were laughable they were so small. 

But on the way home, with his toothless lisp he tells me, "Mommy, you deserve snuggles because you threw such a great party." 

And that's why I do it, folks. 

I'm so grateful to this little boy that made me a mama for the first time. He made my dream come true and I've been smiling ever since. He'll never know how he changed my life for good just by entering this world seven years ago.

Kentucky Derby party

It all began when Campbell saw the Kentucky Derby on TV when he was just 2. Not exactly Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, but he stared at the TV for hours, which for a 2 year old is a miracle. He begged for a horse party but I already had his Cookie Monster party planned for his 3rd birthday (which he loved by the way) but I promised him we would do a horse party for his 4th party.

Well, his request for a horse party became more specific over the year. He wanted a jockey party. Since I get all of my ideas from copying other people I had NOTHING! Then I thought about going with the Kentucky Derby theme since my husband is from Kentucky. I knew he would know more about it than me. In case you're clueless about the derby, I'll give you a quick run down.

Each jockey has a silk from a farm so this is our silk representing our "farm".

There wasn't much to get ideas from since all horse parties seem to be western so I just starting winging it.

These horses were my husbands when he was young. Good thing he's a hoarder (never thought I'd say that) because these have been well loved by Campbell and they made some great table decorations.

Campbell was decked out in his jockey costume that my in-laws found for him. Can you tell he was giddy with excitement about his party?

And here were the party favors. They were almost the death of me but I think they added a cute touch and we used them for a stick horse race later. Some of the poor guys looked like they had the mange or some kind of equine disease but the kids didn't seem to mind at all.

The ONE thing I did find was a printable poster for Pin the Jockey on the  horse from Hostess with the Mostess. Justin added Campbell's face to the jockey. It looked hilarious.

After that we had our own Kentucky Derby stick horse race.

There was some serious galloping and I think even one or two that were thrown from their horse. Guess I should have put blinders on those horses.

I found this tutorial for the cupcake stand on Pinterest. It involves soup cans! Hey sometimes you have to get creative for these type of things.

The cupcakes seemed to be loved and a few messes were made.

But probably my favorite part of the whole party is that all the girls wore their big derby hats. Is it bad that's my only reason for wanting to go see a real Kentucky Derby is to wear an obnoxious huge hat?

I say when it comes to hats, the bigger, the better.

For not having a plan and not much to go off of, I'd say the party was a hit, but I'm always so glad when they're done because they're a lot of work!

But to see him smile, I'd say it's worth all of it!