My mom
Justin's mom
Giliane (my sister)
Matt and Lynsey (brother and SIL)
Hilary (SIL)
Elijah and Josiah (nephews)
Plus me, Justin, and Noah. So there were 8 adults and 3 kids. It was definitely small (of our immediate families we were missing our Dads and one of my brothers, and Giliane's boyfriend of 5 years). But it was very low stress and tons of fun!
The morning of the party Noah really enjoyed the balloons we were blowing up!:
He especially liked this long one. I am still impressed that Justin was able to blow it up by mouth!:
Part of what made the party so low stress is that people brought stuff. Giliane brought a veggie tray, Matt and Lynsey brought a ton of dips and crackers and breads and stuff, and my MIL brought these little finger food thingies. There weren't that many people to feed, so those snacks were really all we needed! I made punch and put out several bags of chips (in bowls, of course), but thankfully I didn't go to any other trouble, snack-wise, because there was already more food than we needed.
While we were setting up food on the island, Noah decided to take present opening matters into his own hands:
I just went with it... there was no reason he had to wait until later. And at this point his cousins weren't there, so there would be no jealousy/confusion.
We already have cut-apart food, but this is wooden Melissa and Doug stuff, so it's much better quality!
An Elmo book, of course!
The weather was perfect. Like many people, we've been having unseasonably warm weather - shorts and t-shirt weather - when often we have snow at this time of year. So we spent most of the party outside. Justin and Matt played with the kids outside on our playground, played with sidewalk chalk, kicked balls around, took them for a walk in the wagon, etc. They had fun, and my house stayed mostly clean.
We BBQed hot dogs and burgers for dinner, and had banana cake with cream cheese frosting for dessert. This was Noah's first cake, and his reaction to the whole thing was pretty cute.
"Umm, what the heck?"
Starting to realize we're singing to him:
He saw the candle! And he loves candles:
"Whoa... give to me!"
Legitimately trying to blow out the candle:
Daddy secretly helping him:
You did it, Noah!
Proud:
Inspecting the candle:
He said, "It's a two!" and then pulled it out.
First bite of cake:
He liked it, but he only ate half of his piece. Which was half the size of everyone else's piece. That's ma boy.
After dinner he did some playing with his Aunts and Uncles.
Aunt Hilary was throwing his big long balloon for him to catch:
Playing with Aunt Giliane and Uncle Matt:
As small a party as it was, I don't regret not inviting more people (not that we really had a lot of time to). It was much calmer this way. I got to talk to everyone extensively, instead of having people show up at my house and I'm just running around like a chicken with my head cut off and can barely socialize.
Another benefit was that Noah didn't get tons of unnecessary presents! He really didn't need many new toys, and he got a much more controlled amount of quality toys, so that was great.
I am seriously so glad that we got to celebrate Noah's birthday with people other than ourselves! It was a great day!
