The big 5th birthday party

For Poppy's 5th birthday, we wanted to have a party where we could invite all of her cousins and family friends, and let her invite a few friends of her own as well.  And she requested that we have her party at one of her all-time favorite places in the world - the playground.  

After weeks of planning and days of weather watching, the day of Poppy's party finally arrived...

We brought lots of picnic blankets and balloons.  The army showed up to do drills (which was pretty exciting for all of the kids to watch) right behind our party.  There was also a group of jugglers meeting on the other side of our party!  Good thing I didn't go to the trouble of hiring entertainment!

We had pb&j sandwiches for the kids, subs for the adults, korean dumplings (of course!) and chips and fruit so that it felt like you were at the park having a picnic...

65 cupcakes, a bunch of enthusiastic singers and Poppy in her glory...

Then it was time for the pinata...

I love watching all the kids scramble to grab as much candy as possible once the pinata breaks open...

Poppy opened her gifts as our guests were getting ready to go.  Even though it's blurry, I just love this picture of Poppy and Ava hugging goodbye...

We were so lucky the weather turned out to be beautiful that day (or else we would have had 40+ people crammed into our house!) and everyone had fun at the party.  Poppy says it was her favorite party ever (and I think it might have been my favorite too).

We've had a crazy and hectic couple of weeks around here.  I was planning on doing individual posts for each event, but well, you get a photo dump instead.  Here we go...

My birthday started with breakfast in bed.  This was a first for Sam and I think he could get used to living like this...

and we finished celebrating my birthday at Shogun.  Sam did not take his eyes off the hibachi chef for 1 second....

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Poppy's end of the year piano recital...

She played "Go Tell Aunt Rhody" and she did such a great job!  We are sooo proud of her...

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Poppy had her first ever soccer game!  She is loving soccer this year...

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Her last day as a 4 year old.  I begged her to not turn 5, but she refused.  She said we can always pretend she's still 4...

This is what I got when I asked her to smile for the camera...

Strawberry ice cream cone cupcakes to take to school for her birthday...


Her birthday lunch was a sprinkle sandwich (which she loved, of course!)...


And then we had Marc's family over for a Korean dinner followed by birthday cake...

She could not believe I put real suckers on her cake.  She barely took a bite of her cake, went straight for the suckers and then told everyone all night "They're real suckers, ya know.  Really, they're real.  You can eat them!"

Sammy enjoyed his sucker too...

and Poppy even played a few songs for everyone at her party...

One of the favorite gifts- the book that goes along with the Arietty movie (which was sooo good, btw)...

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In addition to non-stop partying lately, Marc has been building a treehouse/playset in our backyard.  Everyone is sooo excited about this...

Both Poppy and Sam are quite the helpers...

 

It's going to be so cute when it's done - I can't wait!

Speaking of being so cute, I could just watch these two play together all day.  Today they were pretending Sam was the doctor and Poppy was the doll's mommy...

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 Happy mother's day!  Hope everyone had a wonderful day.  Mine was filled with family time and relaxing...

Stay tuned - Poppy's big birthday party post coming up next...

birthday season

February and March is birthday season for us.  Poppy has about 10 birthday parties coming up.  And she's pretty excited about each one.

On Saturday we celebrated Carter's 4th birthday...

 {Sam really enjoys his dessert.}

After dinner and cake, it was time to be serenaded by these two.  Courtney and Tucker just started taking guitar lessons together.  They both did a great job!  Poppy was in awe of the little concert they gave in their living room...

Then Tucker and Poppy decided to switch instruments and start a band.  And I think they even made a pact to teach each other how to play their instruments.  Should be interesting!

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On Sunday we went to the Strong Museum of Play with Ty and his family...

{a photo-op at Sesame Street} 

{a photo-op as Marc and Sam climbed the side of a skyscraper!}

and check out this pic of Marc and Poppy from 2 years ago...

 {The Berentstein Bear Country was Poppy's favorite place to play}

{This kitchen was Sammy's favorite place to play.  He was by far the littlest kid in there and he held his own and cooked up a storm for close to an hour!}

Happy Birthday Uma!

We celebrated my mom's birthday tonight at PizzaThursday.  We changed up the pizza routine and ordered Moe's to go.  Followed by almond cake.  Yummmm.

Sam's 1st birthday party!

We celebrated Sam's 1st birthday while we were at the beach.  I remembered that the cottage we always rent has a nautical theme with the decor, so I decided to go with it.  It was a little stressful planning a party for when we were away from home, but it turned out so great and looking back, I'm so glad we did.  Sam loves being at the beach and I think he loved having his party there too.

{My favorite boys} 

 {Marc made paper sailboats and sailor hats.  The boats ended up being a big hit with the kids.}

 {We had goodie bags ready for the kids to bring down to the beach.}

 {Birthday boy loved the decorations}

 {Poppy was in her glory, with an audience to read to.}

 {in anticipation of his first bite of cake}

{cupcakes, choco strawberries, and a big cake just for Sam} 

{he didn't hesitate at all with his 'smash cake'} 

{my children do enjoy their desserts} 

{A week before the party, I asked Marc if he could make a paper sailboat to put on top of Sam's cake.  He spent hours making a paper mache/ fabric keepsake boat for him instead.  Didn't it turn out cute?}

 {time to open presents!}

{after presents, we all headed down to the beach to light paper lanterns (I may or may not have gotten that idea from Tangled) but it was waaay too windy to light them that night.}

{my sweet birthday boy}

{he was such a mess by the end of the night, and the cottage only has a stand-up shower, so I had the brilliant idea to give him a bath in the cooler.  He loved it!  He stayed in there forever and did not want to get out!}

Happy Birthday Sammy!