As I started thinking about Barrett's 1st birthday party, I knew I wanted to incorporate his well-fitting nickname into it.
Bear.
Bear.
Little man rocked his "Birthday Bear" shirt :).
This child has definitely lived up to the meaning of his name and his nickname fits him all too well.
I had a random thought in my head after I saw a picture of Barrett and Jax from Halloween in their bear and squirrel costumes to do a forest friends theme. I wasn't sure exactly what I wanted to do, but I knew I wanted something with bears and other little forest animals. I sparked some ideas and gotreally excited to start planning!
I did little things here and there leading up to party and then pulled two really late-nighters with my mom and then Matt's mom the nights before the party. The table was my favorite part! I ordered some cute plates and napkins, found some straws that looked like birch wood, used wood stumps and pinecones for decoration, had little animals on the table, and framed these animal printables I had found. We made cupcakes-some that we put the little forest friend cake toppers on and the other we frosted to look like toadstools, little acorn candies, trail mix, and strawberry toadstools. A friend at work made Barrett's bear smash cake and it turned out so perfect! I also made the "Happy Birthday" banner from a printable I found.
I printed out a bunch of pictures from Barrett's first year and made a collage of them in the shape of a "1". There were pictures all over the house! Might as well display the thousands of pictures taken of this boy the past year :). My mom made some felt animal masks for the little kids to play with and we made a teepee for them to play in too.
We had a ton of family and close friends who made the trip down for the party and we were so grateful! Barrett is one loved little boy.
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| Nolan was sick and couldn't come to the party so we took a picture with him on the phone! :) |
We opened gifts which he didn't last all the way through and mostly just wanted the tissue paper. We are so thankful for all of the awesome gifts everyone got for him. We finished gifts while he walked around and then got him in the highchair for his cake! The candle was lit and we sang "Happy Birthday"! It was hard to believe we were singing that to my baby. I just can't believe he's one! He wasn't a huge fan of the cake and was more interested in feeding it to Matt and I. We made sure to smash his hands in a little :)
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| perfect timing...gagging on cake |
The party was a lot of work and he had no clue what was even going on, but I'm so glad we did it! It turned out much better than I even expected and we all had such a great time. I now know why I am a registered nurse and not a party planner though :)
Happy Birthday, Bear!
