We had a Winter 'ONE'derland birthday party for this happy little girl.
The Decorations and Food
I'm a fan of having a theme for birthday parties (as evident with Sophie's previous parties. It must be the teacher in me). I was searching on Pinterest one day and as soon as I saw pictures of Winter 'ONE'derland parties I knew that I found the theme for Josie's party. Blue, white, snowflakes, and snowmen...sounded perfect to me.
I found some cheap decorations (plastic table cloth, blue and white paper poofs, window clings) as well as the personalized banner at Oriental Trading. I was already ordering things from there for my students for Christmas and I was able to get free shipping when I added on the party decorations (the banner, only $13, helped me get to the total I needed for free shipping, which is why I went ahead and got it). It was a win-win situation. My friend, Becki, had made a tulle and snowflake wreath a few years ago for Christmas and she was nice enough to let me borrow it for the party. My mom made a really cute (and delicious) snowman cheese ball for an appetizer while we waited for Joe to come home with pizza.
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| It is hard to believe how much Josie has changed! |
There have already so many important moments in Josie's life, so I wanted to spotlight that. I used our Ellison machine at school to cut out letters and snowflakes (such a teacher thing, I know). I wrote different moments on each snowflake, such as when she rolled from front to back, when she started sitting up, her first word, birthday stats, etc. I loved getting to relive those memories when I was writing them on the snow flakes.
When we were at SAMs one day we saw a cute little cake with a plastic snowman on it that was surrounded by 10 cupcakes that had plastic snowflake rings on them. We liked them and they went with the theme so we ordered two of them. On the day of the party we put aside one of the small cakes for Josie to have and put the cupcakes on a stand. After everyone was finished eating lunch my nieces insisted it was cake time. Josie stared around at everyone as we sang to her. Since she couldn't blow out the candles on her own, big sister Sophie came to the rescue. Everyone waited expectantly for Josie to dig into the cake. She wasn't too sure what to think. She got some frosting on her fingers and then played with it. She seemed to really enjoy the texture of the icing. We had to put some of the frosting and cake in her mouth to get her to try it. She was more interested in playing than eating though.
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| Big sis helped blow out the candle. |
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| Sophie kept stealing icing off the cake. Josie didn't seem to mind. (side note-This wasn't Sophie's original outfit for the party. The kids were playing dress-up during the party.) |
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| Bath time for Josie! |
After a quick bath and outfit change it was time to open up presents. We didn't have much luck on Josie's actual birthday with her opening gifts, so I wasn't holding my breath that she would have much interest today. Josie played with some tissue paper and touched at the presents, but didn't really do much in terms of opening them. We let Sophie open most of the cards and presents and I opened the rest. Josie decided that her main job would be to put everything in her mouth for approval (she loved them). Josie received so many wonderful presents. We are so fortunate to have such generous friends and family members!
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| Best. Present. Ever. |
A big thank you to everyone who came out to celebrate Josie's birthday!
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| Thumbs up! We survived the party! |
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| Josie loved getting to snuggle with her family. |
**My sister bought Josie her cute outfit for Christmas. The shirt has a big number 1 and a snowflake and says her name underneath and the tutu is pink, blue and white. I failed to get a picture of her in it where you can see what the shirt looks like, which makes me sad!
