Carolina's Fifth Birthday

We have been busy celebrating someone's much anticipated birthday around here!  Carolina has been longing for five since her classmates started turning five throughout the school year.  For some reason at this age they like to rub it in each other's faces.  That sure does turn around sometime in the late 20's!

This is a little video of Carolina in the kitchen helping prepare the cookies that were her party favor.  She loves to help me and is always pulling up her little chair to the counter.  Nico does it too and sometimes I have a lot of "help"!

I made these little cards that say "Be a flamingo in a flock of pigeons".  It describes Carolina because she is definitely her own little independent person.  We had a very loose theme of flamingos which was based on a combination of things.  One, we saw a car with flamingos all over it and she went crazy for it and said that was going to be her car when she gets older.  Two, when I walked into the dollar tree, they had flamingo stuff.  Win-win, I say.

I have a tradition of making her own little cake.  I've made this style before and I need to learn some new decorating tricks!  It turned out pretty but I really wanted some glitter sprinkles on it.  If Hobby Lobby didn't want to charge 7.00 for the tiniest little vial of them, it would have!

We had the party at the splash pad which is always fun on a hot day.  It's also easier on us because no kids destroying the house.  Yay for the parents!

Carolina is so adorable here in her little braids and hat!  She loved having people sing Happy Birthday and she gets it twice because after english we sing in spanish!  What a lucky little girl!

Sweet little friends make parties so special!  We are so blessed to have friends and family to share these birthdays with each year!

Carolina's Meet the Teacher Day

My sweet Carolina is soon going to a Mother's Day Out program one day a week.  It is hard to believe that she is growing up so fast!  I need to document these milestones in her life here because  I'll soon forget if I don't. 

She was a little shy at first today but she soon warmed up, especially after her friend Grace showed up.  They are going to be in the same class so I'm glad she'll have her friend there.

I just love everything about having a 2 year old.  She is babbling away but I can't always understand what she is saying.  She is so cuddly and loves to have me right next to her.  She is independent and a free spirit too.  I love to watch her in a group of kids because she makes friends so easily.  

Those two sweet little girls love each other and I love them!

It's just one step toward letting go a little bit of my baby.  I read the stories of first days of kindergarten and I know I'll be in tears.  

On the non-weepy side of it though, G and I will have every other week on his day off to go to the movies or do whatever we want.  I'm sure I don't have to explain that going out to eat with a 2 year old is not that relaxing.  I'm looking forward to some fast errand running and who knows what else?  I know Carolina is going to have a great time and just maybe, 

she'll learn that not every color is blue.

Carolina's First Birthday Party

Carolina's first birthday party was just perfect!  I had so much fun planning it and joked that it was really my party.  I'm sure she'll make her requests for future themed parties but I was happy to do this one all in my taste.   

We felt so blessed to have our friends and family join us in celebrating her first year.  Most of the kids were little so they would be able to play together and play with her toys.  It was a Saturday morning party so everyone could come and then get on with their day.  

There were so many details but one of my favorite parts was Carolina wearing the bloomers I made her for her newborn photos.  I made them a little big when I was still pregnant (not on purpose!) but it worked out.  She wore some costume pearls that my Nanny gave me a long time ago.  

 I loved having all the little babies crawling and running around the house and it was so adorable to see them interacting with each other.  See the homemade birthday cards from some sweet "older" friends in the collage below.  And just look at the little chat by the window.  I wonder what they were saying.

I know that nobody expects a gift when you are coming to a birthday party but it was fun being creative and putting together the beach bucket gifts.  My favorite thing was a stamp pad and little card for the kids to make art on.  The next day was Father's Day so I thought I was helping out there!

 You can't see them, but I had beach balls hung up through the house and a float as the centerpiece on the table.  I did use Pinterest a lot for planning but my goal was to not spend too much on decorations.  I mostly used what I had.  The most I spent was buying 9 beach balls for 99 cents each.  We also invested in a long table that we can use at holidays as well.

The cake was my masterpiece!!  I love having an excuse to bake and decorate cakes.   I thought I would make a healthy cake for Carolina but in the end, aesthetics won out.  I wanted a pretty cake more than a healthy cake.  Fortunately, she didn't eat hardly any of it.  She touched it and then pushed it over on the floor (on a sheet)!  We all still ate some though even though I made cupcakes for the guests too.

Carolina has been such a joy to us, it's indescribable how much we love her!  I'm so excited that I have more parties to plan for her and a lifetime to love her.

First Birthday Party Plans

I am so excited about Carolina's first birthday party!  I've been googling and pinterest-ing for a few weeks now piecing together what I want to do.  It's not until next Saturday but I have been working on things a little at a time.  

Today I had some help though and it was wonderful!!  I had a little assembly line going to put together mason jar tags and water bottle labels.  Having a teenager full of hot air helped blow up a lot of beach balls too.  I'm so happy I didn't have to do that.  Thanks guys!

Carolina had fun playing in the beverage containers. 

There was even an official goldfish taste test to see which ones I want to serve.  

Can you tell it's a summer beach party theme?  It's a loose theme but I wanted something that would be simple to do.  It all started with the party favors, which are adorable.  

I'm one of those crazy Moms who wants her baby to eat a healthy cake.  I tested this one out because it uses bananas as a sweetener, so no added sugar.  It's kind of like a banana bread and really good.  I still have to test out what icing I'm going to do with it but I'm thinking whipped coconut cream.  I realized this idea of healthy everything is going to be an uphill battle when I saw they are serving marshmallows to the 1 year olds at VBS next week.  

For the guests, I am making strawberry cupcakes.  I baked these today and the icing has real strawberries in it.  After sampling these, I think I'm going to go with a vanilla cake and strawberry icing though.  The strawberry cake competes too much with the icing.

 These are my blue mason jars.  I love them!!  I deliberated over whether to buy them or not because I really don't need any more glasses.  I decided that we would use them a lot in the future and Gustavo really liked them too.  

There was a lot of experimenting with what to do about names on the mason jars.  I have a limited amount 12 blue and 12 clear so people can't just lose their glass.  I was going to do sticky labels but they might sweat off.  Hopefully this will do the trick.  

A friend made water bottle labels at my baby shower and I was completely enamored with them.  They make everything look so much more elegant!  I googled some free templates and found these which go perfectly with beach ball colors.  I just used packing tape to put them on.  So simple and free!

I'll be working on a lot more little details through the week.  I'm having so much fun planning for her first party.  It's a great distraction so I don't have to focus on how a year has passed and how it can be that my little baby is turning one.

Sob.

Easter Pictures & a Fab Dress

I hope it's not too late for Easter pictures. 

I love these Daddy-Daughter photos!  G is such a sweet and caring man.   He is going to be such a great Papa too.  She may want me more now because of the milk situation, but I know one day she'll be a total Daddy's girl.  I'm not going to lie that it might break my heart if she wants him more than me.

Carolina loves to eat her shoes which is starting to become a problem.  

 I'm glad you can't see my dress because it does not at all coordinate with the family.  It was a minor major crisis in our house that morning.  

 I bought this aqua dress at Janie and Jack and she has worn it for all sorts of important occasions.  First was her baby dedication, then she wore it for Christmas in Puerto Rico, then Easter and she still has many more wears to come.  I love a versatile dress, even when it's for a baby.  I try to buy her stuff extra big so she can wear it a lot.

The Target dollar spot has become an essential stop by every time I'm there.  Bunny ears, yes please.

This was baby dedication in October 2012.  G loves my really blonde hair but it was an accident on my last hair appointment before giving birth.  That is what happens when you show a picture of Reese Witherspoon.

This was Christmas 2012 in Puerto Rico.  I had to have the matching sunglasses.  The whole outfit is very Caribbean don't you think?

It's amazing how when you wait to download pictures from your camera, they all of a sudden seem like ancient history.  Goodness how time flies!  

*This post is brought to you by Carolina pulling all the tupperware out of the kitchen cabinets.

Catching Up

The baby is napping, finally.  It seems that I haven't been blogging lately.  Oh, I have though.  It's just been in my head.  I blog all the time in fact.  I may not remember what I started with going from one room to another though.

This little one has been keeping me busy.  

There are so many things to share but there need to be more naps.  She's never been a good sleeper.  I know, I know baby wise, sleep training, blah blah blah.  Let's just say I've learned a lot about myself.  

How about a list?

1.  I'm not as organized as I thought I was.

2.  I'm not a disciplinarian, in fact a total baby enabler.

3.  Coffee is my BFF

4.  I don't like to hear crying, which leads me back to lack of naps...

So, since we last talked, this has happened.  It's been awhile.

Yes, my child who turned 11 months a few days ago is walking.  She's walking everywhere now.  Crawling is so last week.

Can I just say that dressing my baby girl is one of my favorite things in the world?  Every morning we go to the closet and say "What are we going to wear today?"  Accessorizing her outfits is of extreme priority as well.  If we don't have a bow that matches, many hours of looking on Etsy ensue.  

We have a lot of shoes, but I just ordered her one pair in navy blue for the summer.  They are her multi-tasking, go with everything shoe, however she kind of ruined the front part by eating them in the car yesterday.  I just had to laugh when she smiled at me with blue dye on her face.  I was a little mad though.

That's all for now.  Welcome back, me.

Until next time nap.