Celebrating Elliott's 3rd Birthday with the Neighbors

Steve and Alina started off Saturday, October 17th getting ready for Elliott's birthday party. Even though the party started at 3pm, we still had to straighten up the house, organize the snacks, blow up all the balloons and clean up ourselves and the kids. While we were busy doing adult things, Elliott grabbed a book and began reading to himself, something he has been doing a lot lately. Not be outdone, Rosemary grabbed a book, too. Very cute!

For this party, we invited our neighbors with young kids and their parents. Here is a photo of almost everyone who attended. Amy and her son Andrew (age 2) had not yet arrived. The rest of the guests: Michael & Mylene with their sons Joaquin (7), Sebastian (4) and Amelia (not yet 1). Lauren and Jessica, who is curretly pregnant, plus their daughter Lauren who is almost exactly the same age as Elliott. They are a week apart. Chris brought her kids Sam (7), Anne(4) and Augustine (almost 2). Chris's husband Steven was on a business trip to Prague. Preeti brought her two kids Yash (4) and Samira (1.5).

For our main decoration, we bought a small helium tank at a local party store and blew up 50 red and blue balloons. Even though the inexpensive balloons and helium only last about six hours, it was more than enough time to surprise the kids! Our room has a high ceiling so the balloon floated above our heads with red and blue strings hanging down. For added fun, we organized party favors for the kids (red & blue chinese food boxes with spider-man goodies) and party favors for the adults (fancy root beer from Trader Joe's). We also decorated kid-sized cups with straws and lids for the lemonade.

Steve baked a 6-inch cake to decorate with spider-man and baked a batch of cupcakes with spider-man cupcake 'papers' (what are those called??) Elliott adored his spider-man cake. To make the cake, Steve meticulously created a stencil that he kept cutting down and used it to apply the different colors of frosting. Cake decorating is a lot harder and more time consuming than you think! Alina frosted the cupcakes.

We played Pin-the-Tail-on-the-Donkey with the kids, which was a hit. We tried a round of Hokey Pokey but that didn't go over as well. Most of the time, the kids all played very nicely with each other and with some of Elliott and Rosemary's toys. The party took place primarily in our kitchen/playroom. We have plenty of space for the adults to chat and the kids to spread out. It was so nice for us to see all of the neighbors laughing and talking with each other. We love living on such a friendly street with so many young kids.

Rosemary wore an adorable pink dress! She spent most of the time in our arms, safe and close. With 11 extra kids in the house, she became a little bit uncertain. Although she loves her crowd of kids at daycare, having our house filled with kids was clearly unnerving. After a few of the families departed, she did play with the kids and enjoy herself a little more.

This is the first occasion Elliott showed off great skill at opening his gifts! When you ask him to "smile!" for the camera, he scrunches his eyes shut. Close enough. He smiled more naturally when asked to point at the gifts he received from his friends.

Throwing a party is a lot of work and a lot of clean-up, but totally worth the time and effort. We love making happy memories for Elliott and love spending happy times with our neighbors.