Brittlynn’s First Birthday Party

Brittlynn’s first birthday party was on Saturday Dec 8th at 3:30 pm. I love to have our parties in the afternoons…our kids are well rested from naps and it gives me the day to get everything ready! Thankfully I didn’t have to do ANY cooking the day of! But I was still busy the entire day getting the house clean and everything ready (it’s tough to get your house party ready with TWO kids!). 

This was the smallest birthday party we’ve had. Kye’s 1st party was HUGE. Like it was so crazy I don’t even remember majority of it (you can see his 1st birthday party post HERE). This time we kept it simple. Invited only family and close friends. Many of whom couldn’t make it due to sicknesses or travel plans (curse of a Dec birthday!). Honestly though, I’m thankful for the small crowd. It was AWESOME. So, so, SO relaxed. I got to ENJOY the party in a way I never have been able to before and Zach and I both agreed that we are sticking to a small party from now on! πŸ™‚

You can see all the details of the party decor HERE!

I love these of our little family!

Only funny thing in this picture…look at Zach’s/my arm…hahaha

Something else that REALLY helped ease my stress was having someone there taking pictures for me. I asked a sweet girl from our church (shout out to Haley Flythe!) to take pictures for us throughout the party and I paid her like I would if she were babysitting for us. Wasn’t that a good idea??? I looked into hiring a professional photographer for the party but the least expensive one I could find was still more than my entire party budget allowed!!! Plus I don’t need professional quality images from a birthday party…I’m totally fine with just snapshots! It made it SO much less stressful for me b/c I wasn’t worried about taking pictures and could just enjoy myself πŸ™‚

With Aunt Karen!

She does not like going to other people haha

Sweet Katie! Our friend for life πŸ™‚

G-Mama and Big Papa with the grand babies

Trey was able to come for a bit before work

Party guests started to arrive!

Titus and Neela REALLY wanted to play in Kye’s playroom

The ornament crafts were a HIT

This is funny to me…Mr Rusty and Seth such bffs πŸ˜‰

G-Mama taking over as usual! Making sure the kids didn’t make a mess I’m sure πŸ™‚

Crissy and Olive!

Casey is gonna be SUCH a good mama! She grabbed Coop up right away!

Preston and Ashley

Cake: Ready and Waiting 

(I’m impressed that none of the preschoolers stuck a finger in it…)

Payton’s finished ornament

I love how Little Mama wore her snowflake shirt to fit the theme!

Guys grubbing out πŸ˜‰

Kye’s finished ornament

Pretty Lorelai

I love that we have so much seating in the back yard! We let the kids fix their plates then head out back to minimize messes πŸ˜‰ Kye was SO excited to get to eat all the treats he helped me make!!! And especially to drink the “pink drink” (pink lemonade)

I LOVE the age difference between our children. Kye is old enough now where I didn’t have to worry about him. I wasn’t worried what he was doing during the party…I also wasn’t worried about party details because all the food I had was out…and I wasn’t worried about snapping a bunch of pictures. I spent EVERY second of Brittlynn’s party with Brittlynn. And seriously…her little personality just BLOSSOMED! She was precious. It’s hard to really focus on each child individually, but I got two full hours of just Britt time and it was wonderful. She LOVED having all the attention from everyone and was being so funny. She was crawling everywhere!!! Everyone kept thinking she was going to start walking right then and there haha sorry to disappoint but it didn’t happen πŸ™‚ Here’s a video of her!

I love these pics…you can see she was having a BLAST!

Most of the kids were outside at this point so Britt had EVERYONE’S attention and the freedom to roam πŸ™‚

My least favorite moment of any birthday party is the gift opening. There’s always a bunch of kids trying to “help” open and a ton of people sitting around…I get claustrophobic just thinking about it. We decided to open gifts before doing cake as we knew the cake would be a messy experience and thought it was better to save until the end πŸ™‚ I let everyone know we were doing presents but told them NOT to worry with coming inside to watch. Most of the kids stayed outside…including Kye. Which was fine. I did not AT ALL force him to do anything during the party. He was having fun with his friends and there was no need for him to have to sit and watch her open presents or eat cake. He did great on her actual birthday and showed her plenty of attention then! 

The gift opening was, like the rest of the party, SO CHILL. Zach and I both got to sit with Britt and open her presents together and she was ADORABLE. Seriously. She got SO into it and really had fun. She especially loved “reading” all the cards. For once I truly did ENJOY the gift opening πŸ™‚

The cards were her favorite πŸ™‚

Stevie is so sweet and wanted to come watch

SCORE! A few people actually glanced through the baby book πŸ˜‰

Aunt Casey and Big Papa watched Britt open too!

Brittlynn got such wonderful thoughtful presents. We have seriously enjoyed each and every one of them!!! I sent thank yous to thank everyone personally but I do wish I’d taken a picture of all of her presents together. I didn’t even think about it! When the party was over she was so excited to play with everything we just busted it all out and let her go to town πŸ™‚

I never once went outside during the party haha I heard from others that the older crew had a GREAT time! I’m glad it all worked out and am thankful for our big back yard and lots of outside toys πŸ™‚ Kye has been really into raking lately and Zach told me that he pretty much spent the ENTIRE party raking leaves haha

Our little worker!

I love that the playground got some use too!

The Megow Ladies!

I also heard Cooper was a spitting up machine…Maybe Britt makes him nervous? πŸ˜‰

Just like with the presents…I let everyone know we were going to do the cake and let those who wanted to come in for it come but didn’t stress over it. Seriously. I was 100% focused just on Brittlynn πŸ™‚ Casey even took over video taping duties so we had both camera and video camera under control and we didn’t have to mess with any of it!!! Here’s a video of Britt enjoying her cake!!! You can also go back and see Kye’s 1st birthday cake experience HERE πŸ™‚

Waiting so patiently

The cake had a TON of icing…she was getting straight icing for a good while!

Love this face πŸ˜‰

Haha Jolee!

She was in HEAVEN!!!

Food + People Watching Her = One Happy CHILD!!!

Haha I was scared to get too close…that hot pink frosting made me nervous πŸ˜‰

Going to TOWN!

I wasn’t about to take it away from her πŸ˜‰

People started leaving as she was finishing up…worked out great!

The Mullican Family

The Megows!

Sisters πŸ™‚

I finally took it away and cleaned her up. It took a LOT of baby wipes haha

The boys were having a BLAST outside with Kye’s tools!

Uncle Jordan is such a good sport πŸ™‚

So thankful for these two!!!

Best Buds and Bros πŸ™‚

The party was SUCH a success!!! I think all the guests had a good time??? I kept the flow moving pretty fast and it was DONE by 5, most people had left by 4:30ish even! Short, sweet, and lots of FUN! Britt really, really enjoyed herself and that was what was MOST important to me. I hope I can have Kye’s next party be as chill and fun as this one was πŸ™‚ We are inviting a couple of his friends and keeping it small. I do think small parties are where it’s at! Cheaper, more relaxed, and more fun for everyone πŸ™‚

I’m really thankful to everyone who helped make it such a success. We have such wonderful friends and family, we are very blessed. Robyn went above and beyond to help me get everything ready and I really appreciated it SO much. She came over the night before the party and we got everything ready so all I had to do on Saturday was clean house πŸ™‚ 

We attempted tissue pom poms and agreed we do NOT know what we’re doing haha

She put the favors together for me and tied all the ribbons! Super cute!

Of course I’m SO thankful to Zach too! He kept things going smoothly the day of the party and was AWESOME helping me get everything ready prior to party time! Now we have to start planning Kye’s next! I hope as we have more children we can spread out their birthdays…I can’t IMAGINE trying to do more than one birthday in a month!!! 

This was my favorite party yet and I’m super excited for all the parties to come!!!!

5 Comments

  1. The Troutman's
    January 14, 2013 / 4:47 pm

    That picture of Preston and me is cracking me up. I like the redneck look of his belly hanging out! Lol! Thanks for having us. I've been to each party, and they have all been super fun!

  2. Ashley Troutman
    January 14, 2013 / 9:33 pm

    Preston's belly hanging out like a redneck is cracking me up! Thanks for inviting us! I have been to each birthday party, and it means a lot to be a part of such a special day.

  3. ChelleyN
    January 15, 2013 / 4:10 am

    You did a great job on all the decor and such! Bri and Bren's birthdays are only 8 days apart (and Bren's is the day after we fly home from Disney!). As much as I want to give Bren his own special party since it is his first, there is NO WAY I can do two parties right after a big vacation. So, we're doing a combined party and not stressing about it! I would have never planned two birthdays in the same month, but it obviously wasn't up to me πŸ™‚

  4. Robyn Mullican
    January 24, 2013 / 1:18 am

    You did a GREAT job on this party!! I think it was a perfect 1st birthday for her!

  5. Robyn Mullican
    January 24, 2013 / 1:19 am

    And yay for our decor fail – haha.

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