a party for noey

For Noah's birthday, I decided after finding some fun inspiration on Pinterest, that we would do an "underwater" themed birthday.

When the guests first arrived I had a craft ready for them to do. At this age, creating anything that is too complicated can sometimes lead to frustrated or overwhelmed little ones. So, I stuck to a pre-cut "water wave" crown and had each child decorate their crown with glitter glue, bingo dabbers and underwater stickers. This craft seemed to be a hit with most of them and was an appropriate craft for the ages of the children that attended (2-5).

Ever since I was a little girl, we would always play the fishing pond game at our birthday parties, which kind of became my jump off point for the whole theme of the party. I was really excited to be able to share this game with Noah and it was so much fun to watch the children's faces as they each had a turn to go fishing. The way it works is that you set up a sheet in a door way and have someone go on the other side of the sheet. The children then get a turn to throw the fishing rod over the sheet and a prize is then attached to their fishing rod. In this case we use individual bags of goldfish crackers.

After they ate their snack of goldfish crackers, whoever wanted could come into the kitchen to play the bean bag toss game that Winslow created. I had asked Winslow earlier in the week to build a simple bean bag toss game that would have fish cut outs. Leave it to my wonderful hubby to go above and beyond what was expected. He made a rcokin' bean bag game and the kids LOVED it! This was definitely a hit and is something we can use again and again when we want some entertainment.

After the activities we had our lunch. Fresh fruit skewers and fruit dip, fresh veggie skewers and veggie dip and homemade pizza! The lunch was gobbled up by everyone. After the lunch came the fish shaped cupcakes (inspiration found here) and I displayed them on my cupcake rack. Noah knew exactly what to do when the candles were lit. I had a little moment when I watched him blow them out. There's something so beautiful about seeing a little child's face as they blow out their birthday candles, so full of excitement and awe.

After the cupcakes came the opening of gifts. Noah received so many beautiful and thoughtful gifts. 3 gorgeous books-one about a train, one about a boy and a martian and one with a moving tractor, a train set, a special monogramed hooded towel set, pjs, shadow puppets, a matching game and more! What a very lucky boy he is to have received such thoughtful gifts. Thanks friends.

After the gifts it was time to say goodbye to our guests. Each guest got to leave with a little sewn cloth goodie bag that was filled with homemade playdoh, marble crayons, fruit treats, stickers and bubbles. Just a little something to say thank you for coming and for making Noah's day so special. Each guest also took home their crowns with them.

The party was definitely a success and Noah had so much fun at it. I planned for it to be in the morning because along with Noah, many of the guests that attended still go down for an afternoon nap. This way they could enjoy their morning, have a lunch and then head home for a nap. Noah passed out right after the last guest left.

It was so special to have the party at our new house this year. I planned for it to be on a day that Winslow could be off from work and I was so thankful for all that he did to make the party go the way that it did. All in all, Winslow and I were super happy with how it turned out and we are pretty sure that Noah loved it too!

xox

ps. click on the collages to enlarge. pps. I didn't get any photos of our awesome decorations but they were awesome.