Hayes

Hayes's First Fiesta: the birthday boy and friends!

May202012

Okay, I’m finally getting around to posting the remaining pictures that Rachel took from Hayes’s party. There were so many amazing pictures of Hayes, our family, and our friends! It took me forever to decide which ones to post and then there were still too many.

We were so thankful to have about 50 of our friends and family there. We invited friends with kids and friends without kids. So many of our friends have kids that are Hudson’s age or Hayes’s age. And a lot of our friends have kids both of our kids’ ages. It’s so much fun to get them all together!

At Hayes’s party, everyone just ate and the kids ran around and had a great time just running. Then Hayes devoured his cake. He defined “smash cake” that day. He absolutely loved it!

So this post is really just a picture dump, but I just have to post them for my memories. Enjoy!

Hayes's First Fiesta: The Fiesta Details

Filed Under: Featured Posts, Hayes, Parties and Showers

May72012

We had Hayes’s First Fiesta at the historic home where Todd’s firm is located. They have some gorgeous grounds around the property and we held the party on the grounds. It was so green and so beautiful!

All the kids were able to just run around the whole time. It was so much fun watching them all play together! And the birthday boy was really happy!

My friend Rachel came to Columbia for the party and she took pictures for me! She did such a great job. Katie came, too, and they both ended up helping me finish setting up. So thankful they were there!

The dessert table had all of Hayes’s monthly pictures labeled with number labels from Sweet Birdie’s Nest, my go-to party goods girls! The “Fiesta” painting was done by Nat Kat Designs, the same talent behind the “Celebrate” painting we had at Hudson’s party. Natalie was so kind to do a painting for Hayes, too!

We had cupcakes, the smash cake, chocolatti cookies and Mexican wedding cookies. Oh my goodness! Everything was so yummy!

Cupcake toppers by Sweet Birdie’s Nest and cupcake wrappers are from Shop Sweet Lulu.

I used the same 12 buckets that I had from Hudson’s first birthday, but my mom and I covered them in colored paper napkins so we could get as much color as possible.

We made the yummy individual 7-layer dip cups from Pinterest. And I made the topiaries out of paper drink umbrellas. I filled the pots with dried black beans.

You can see the little cactus favors we gave to all of the guests. We found the cacti at Home Depot the day before the party. We wrapped the plastic pots in tissue paper and included the little “muchas gracias” tags from Sweet Birdie’s Nest.

The main food table included paper poms made out of paper napkins. We served a fajita bar from Moe’s. Moe’s delivers and is so easy to work with.

The little utensil wrappers and food tent labels were done by Sweet Birdie’s Nest. I love wrapping utensils while watching television late at night!

We had about six small pinatas around the yard. Todd filled them all with candy and small toys the night before. The pinatas hung really low so they were at eye level with the little kids. I think they liked them!

The adorable iced cookies were our other party favor. The wonderful folks at A Dozen Eggs came through for us again. The iced cacti, sombreros, and burro pinatas were so cute!

We had five round tables set up around the yard. They were covered in yellow paper table cloths and striped table cloths. We used a different color stripe table cloth on each of the five tables. I loved having so much color around the yard.

We topped the tables with vases of paper flowers. Each table also had a bowl of chips and some salsa.

We set up a little photo booth using a sheet hung on the outside of the house. Sweet Birdie’s Nest made the cute banner. I had about 6 large sombreros, some sticky mustaches, and maracas to use as props in the photo booth.

The fun “blog girls” that were there! Rachel, Megan, Katie, and Tiffany were so great to come celebrate the day!

Vendors:

Paper Goods (banner, cupcake toppers, stickers, favor tags, high chair banner, and favor sign): Sweet Birdie’s Nest

Invitations: Sarah from Life Sweet Life

Cupcake liners: Shop Sweet Lulu

Fabric for table cloths: Oil Cloth By The Yard

Poms: Made with paper napkins by my mom and me

Cookie Favors: A Dozen Eggs

Other cookies: Ally and Eloise

Paper fans: Party Express

Sombreros, Maracas, Papel Picado: Amazon.com

Hayes's First Fiesta: The Invitations

Filed Under: Hayes, Uncategorized

May62012

I have to split this post up into two or three posts because you’d have picture overload if I didn’t.

When my c-section with Hayes was scheduled for May 5, I immediately got excited that our little boy would be able to celebrate his birthday on Cinco de Mayo. Of course, I was mostly thinking about his 21st birthday, but why not have a festive Cinco de Mayo party to celebrate his first year? And Cinco de Mayo fell on a Saturday this year, so we were able to have our fun theme on his actual birthday.

My friend Sarah designed the invitations for us. I just wanted lots of color and papel picado and I am so so so happy with the way they turned out. They’re just so happy!

(I had to blur out the location and RSVP information)

I wanted the back of the invitation to be in stripes to match the table cloths we made for all of the round tables. I just love stripes for a boy and all of the colors are so happy!

I’m trying to organize all of the fun pictures of our friends and all the party details. We had a wonderful weekend celebrating our precious baby boy with all of our family and friends.

Hayes is 1!

Filed Under: Hayes, Uncategorized

May52012

My Dear Sweet Hayes,

Today, you turned 1 year old. Where did this year go? A year ago today, you came into our lives with your gentle, content spirit and melted our hearts.

photo by Rachel

Over the past year, you have shown us how different two babies can be despite growing up in the same home. You are a much more relaxed and calm baby than your brother was. You are content to just sit and watch rather than move around and “do.”

You light up whenever anyone looks at you and people just fall in love with your smile and sweet personality.

In a house with a loud toddler, I find myself enjoying so much about you because it is comforting to me. Many nights, I will just hold you and we’ll smile at each other. I love that you are content to just sit and chat or read books.

This year has gone by way too quickly, but I have learned and grown so much during this year because of you. I am so thankful for you, Hayes. You have calmed us down with your calm demeanor and have just been such a trooper. You are so patient.

You love Hudson and love to push his buttons. If we can’t find you, we know you’re sitting in Hudson’s room playing with his toys. And this drives Hudson crazy! If Hudson is running wild around the house, you will just watch him and laugh.

You will go to anyone! We joke that you’re not a very “loyal” baby. You will let anyone hold you and have never cried when we’ve dropped you off at the nursery or when we leave you with a sitter. You just love everyone!

We’re still waiting on your first word and waiting for you to clap. I know you’ll get around to it eventually. You are probably laughing at us as we are constantly clapping at you to get you to clap back.

You love to eat! Finally! We dropped your bottles cold turkey this week. You are drinking whole milk and we are completely done with formula. Your favorite foods are chicken, meatballs, peas, avocado and bananas.

We love you, sweet Hazer. Thank you for being your sweet self. Your daddy and I are so thankful for you!

Love,

Mommy