Lilly's First Birthday Party

What a fun day!  First, the weather was absolutely beautiful.  It was a gorgeous sunny day, but not hot and humid like many summer days in the south.  We even took a mid day walk before Lilly's afternoon nap.  I think having such a beautiful day made all of us extra happy and was a great start to our perfect day!

After her afternoon nap, it was time to get Lilly ready for the party!  We put her in her party dress and I even managed to get her to keep a bow in her on her head for a few minutes so we could snap a few pre-party pictures.  Darren snapped my new favorite picture of Lilly and I and I snapped a great one of Darren and Lilly as well.  I could already tell Lilly was in a great mood and she was going to have a great party!

I wanted to have a few "games" or things to do at the party, so I made a "Who Does Lilly Look Like?" game where people could look at baby pictures of Darren and I next to Lilly and then fill out a card saying which features Lilly shares with me and which she shares with Darren.  Most people say Lilly looks just like Darren, but I think she has my smile (and most people at the party agreed with me).  It was interesting to see how some people had completely opposite opinions.  I guess that goes to show that Lilly has a perfect blend of the two of us; she is the very best of both of us :o)

I also put together an album of the weekly pictures we have been taking of Lilly since she was one week old.    I didn't just do this for the party; I did this for us.  I love looking back at all of Lilly's pictures and seeing how much she has grown and changed this year.  We also made a keepsake of Lilly's hand and foot prints that I displayed.  Aunt Jess gave this to us at Lilly's baby shower and I was waiting until she turned a year old to make it.  That day came much quicker than I thought!

You can't see them well, but we also put out Lilly's newest photos so everyone could see our favorites in print.  They are all on my blog from last week if you missed them :o)

The other activity I set up was a Wishing Pond.  I laid out lily pads and a "pond" for people to write a birthday wish or a favorite memory from Lilly's first year.  I thought this would be a nice thing to add to Lilly's baby book so she has something from her first birthday party.

 Our friend and coworker, Kelly L, is an extremely talented cake artist and baker and she made Lilly's cupcakes and smash cake.  I was SO excited when I saw them!  They both turned out exactly as I had hoped.  Thank you Kelly for making Lilly's birthday special with custom cupcakes!

The party started and I was trying to snap pictures whenever I could, but I was on "Lilly duty" which meant I was in the thick of it with the other moms watching all the babies and kiddos play in the living room.  I was so happy that all the kids played so nicely together.  There were 4 babies all around the same age (Lilly, Emma, Joey and Gentry), so that was really cute to see them all playing together.  Lilly absolutely loves other babies, but she is fascinated with their faces (especially their eyes), so I was prepared to play referee a lot.  Luckily Lilly was great (as were all the other little ones) and we didn't have a SINGLE incident!  Here is a great picture of Lilly giving Emma a hug and a kiss!  She was very eager to give hugs and kisses to the other babies.

Here she goes trying to get Joey and give him kisses!  I hope Darren is ready for teenage Lilly ;o)

 Here are a couple of shots of the moms and babies in our living room (i.e. playroom)

 I was so excited to see Lilly have her first cake that I didn't even let her have a cupcake at the birthday party we went to a week ago.  I really wanted her to go to town and make a huge mess!  Darren hates when she gets messy while she is eating, but it doesn't bother me.  I wanted to see my baby covered in cake!

Here is a before shot.

This is right after everyone sang happy birthday and Lilly blew out the candle.

And here is Lilly in the midst of her "smash" cake.  Her hands were getting a little messy, but she was mostly smearing frosting on her tray and not on herself!

 Her hands were full of cake and frosting, but she still wasn't messy enough!

 We tried showing Lilly how to touch her head, saying "hair" over and over and even singing "head, shoulders, knees and toes" but Lilly was not getting messy.  So I called in reinforcements: the headband.  I knew that Lilly would reach up to get that headband off and would get messy!

 Except that she didn't...

I think this is the only shot we have of the three of us from Lilly's birthday.  Happy birthday, baby girl!

After her smash cake, I just let Lilly play in her diaper for a little while.  I think she was pretty happy about it!

The ball pit was definitely the biggest hit of the party.  Al the kids loved it!  They did a great job of taking turns and also being careful when the babies wanted to go in.  All three of the girls got in the ball pit at one point, but the pictures didn't come out.

 Lilly was showing Joey how her stage worked.  They were both pressing all the buttons and dancing tot he music.

After everyone left it was almost time for bed.  Since Lilly had to have a bath anyway, I decided to give her half of a banana with her diner and just let her go to town.  Apparently Lilly was all about her "smash banana" because she made a total mess!  She had banana all over herself!  I guess next year we won't bother with a cake, we'll just give her fruit salad!  ;o)  I'm just kidding.  At least I got my messy baby pictures.  I shouldn't be surprised that Lilly was more interested in fruit than sweets since she has never had sweets before so it was probably overwhelming.

Darren, Lilly and I had such a great time at her first birthday party!  Thank you to everyone who came to celebrate with her and to our amazing friends and family who could not be there but celebrated with Lilly in their own way.  We are so lucky to have so many amazing people in Lilly's life who love her so much.