Lucy's 4th Birthday Party - April 13, 2013

Lucy's birthday fell on a Saturday so it worked out perfectly to have a party on her actual birthday (after checking with the other moms in my neighborhood who also have children with birthdays quite close or on the same day - Asher & Maya didn't have party at all and Aeli would have her party the next Saturday). I wanted to make Lucy's birthday extra special since I expected that the transition of being an only child to having a little baby brother might be a little difficult and for her to know that we loved her just as much. However, her party was so big last year that I really wanted to simplify it all. I decided we should greatly reduce the number of kids we invited so I decided that it should just be girls - I would have really liked to keep the number of attendees to four to coordinate with her age but it ended up being 6 just because that is the the number of friends and cousins that she has and we didn't want to leave anyone out. We also let the parents know that they could just drop their kids off as well or that they were welcome to stay. But I love that I can drop Lucy off now and not have to hang around and have some time to myself so I was counting that most of the other parents would feel the same.

For several weeks in advance, I had been asking Lucy what kind of party she wanted. I think because her cousin, Olive, just had a princess party in January, Lucy didn't want to copy her so she chose a fairy party. I would have loved to take lots of time researching on-line and finding unique ideas on Pinterest but I ended up going the commercial route with generic Disney fairy decorations. While Lucy was in preschool, Grey and I went to Zurchers to pick up party supplies and decorations. I didn't want to spend too much money and I think I kept it under $30 for the decorations and party favors (I spent much more just on food the year before).

With a new baby, I was hoping to make this the least stressful event possible for me which meant lots of planning in advance. I borrowed Vince and Peggy's table again to combine with ours and set everything up and decorated the night before. Sometimes I think that decorations are dumb and wasteful but it really does make things feel a little more special. I think I also made the cake the night before as well. One of the best things about hosting a party is that it forces you to clean your home which is always a nice thing.

I wanted to keep the activities/crafts/games super simple so I limited it to two. Brandon was in charge of the face painting and thank goodness for Amazon Prime that we could order the face paints with limited time. Lucy's birthday party ended up being the same weekend as an anniversary party for Brandon's maternal grandparents down in St. George so unfortunately, Brandon's brothers, Damian and Ethan couldn't make it since they committed to attending the other event which was a shame because I bet Damian would have been awesome at face painting. But considering Brandon's artistic talent, he did fine on his own and it was fun for all the little girls. 

Super simple, remember? I used the regular snacks that I had in my pantry so I wouldn't have to make any special trips to the store or spend tons of money on food.

I am so cheap, even though there are Disney fairy juice boxes you can buy, I just opted to cut out the extra cardboard packaging from the decorations and favors that I bought and just taped them on the juice boxes. It also helped the girls to remember which juice box was theirs. Am I resourceful or what?

The goody bags - the usual assortment of stickers, temporary tattoos, stamps, and pencils from the party store and dollar store. I tried to make it non-candy cause I'm so sick of Lucy having so many sweets so I didn't want to annoy other moms with junk food.

By the way, Lucy is Rosetta and I'm Silvermist. Lucy said so and I think that it fits. That is Silvermist up above.

Face painting took a while so it was good that we didn't have a ton of kids and could stagger it a bit (with Lucy first and then Olive who arrived earlier before the party started).

 The finished product - butterfly eyes and a heart soul patch.

Olive opted for a simpler heart on the cheek. Most of the girls dressed up as fairies and for our craft, we (mostly the parents) made fairy wands. This barely cost me a thing because we already had a bunch of wooden dowels left over from making kites at Lucy's birthday party last year and I had a ton of extra ribbon lying around. I just bought some foam stickers and extra foam from the dollar store that I cut out into shapes with cookie cutters and used tape for everything. It was a pretty big hit so I was glad with the way it turned out.

Most of the girls chose heart wands with pink or purple ribbon even though I had cut out a wide assortment of other shapes and had tons of other colored ribbon. Should have figured and saved myself some time. At least I didn't spend a ton of money.

We tried to get a picture of Lucy and all five of her friends but Liani didn't want to get in the picture (Aeli didn't arrive to the party until later because it was her brother, Willem's baptism). So we just got her in the foreground.

The girls were all so adorable! Lucy, Noel (who she goes to preschool with and lives a couple houses away), cousins Marlo & Olive, and Maya from across the street who is only a year younger than Lucy but so tiny!

In between face painting, making wands, and eating snacks, I stole Emily's idea of just having the girls color pictures of fairies that I printed off from the internet.

 Then it was time to open presents!

 My Little Pony from Liani.

 A Laloopsy Doll from Noel.

And a plasma car from Olive and Marlo!! Olive and Marlo got plasma cars for Christmas and Lucy always felt left out when they were playing with them so she got a cool red one from her cousins. There were lots more fun presents that we didn't get pictures of (and I never sent thank you cards for even though I bought some fairy ones) but everyone was so generous. Even though I would prefer not to have presents at all, I know that would be disappointing for Lucy.

My one big splurge in effort was Lucy's birthday cake. I decided to make it from scratch since I had purchased store-made cakes for her last three birthdays which probably didn't have the best ingredients. I wanted to avoid crazy preservatives and artificial colors and flavorings so I found a recipe that used beets to color the frosting! I don't even bother with the fondant - it may look nice when done correctly (though so often it isn't) but I think it tastes gross and I know you can just take it off before you eat it but I can't stand seeing something edible thrown away. I was also thinking of hiring someone to make a fancy cake but I'm just too cheap! I was pretty proud of how it all turned out making it myself with regular frosting. And I got to use my cake stand that barely makes it out of the box once a year.

 I wish I took a picture before the candles all melted but you get the idea.

We didn't want to spoil Lucy with a ton of gifts so we kept it pretty simple too. I had Brandon pick up two books for her since she is really into stories. A book of fairy tales (A Treasury of Children's Literature) and one of Greek mythology (D'Aulaires' Book of Greek Myths).

In addition, I ordered this cute bathrobe from Target and it was only $5! Olive has a bathrobe which Lucy loves and she has wanted one for a while so I had been keeping my eye out for one for months but I couldn't seem to find any for less than $30 (which is absolutely ridiculous - I'm not paying that much!). I knew that Emily had bought Olive's robe from Target on clearance so how happy was I when I saw that they had kid's bathrobes on Target's daily deal site for $5 and free shipping! I just wish I bought more to give as gifts but they were literally selling out as I was buying Lucy's. I just wish it came in time for Lucy's birthday but it ended up arriving several days later. In some ways, it actually was nice to extend the celebration a little bit longer.

Anyway, it was a lovely day that ended with some swimming with her cousins at Vince & Peg's home and dinner there so I didn't have to do a thing the rest of the day. I think she went to bed that night exhausted and happy from all the excitement and activity. I can't believe my little girl is 4 years old. Happy Birthday Lucy!

Emily's version