Party Animals

Well, guys - it is that time of year again.  May. The month of many celebrations.  Five to be exact.  One for Mother's Day, one for my birthday and guess who the other THREE are for?  Yep - you guessed it. Our oldest pride and joy....

It started with the first weekend in May.  We had Avery's "kid party" on Saturday and her "family party" on Sunday.  We typically would have done these both the following weekend in order to combine 4 of the 5 celebrations in one weekend (and nearly kill myself in the process of entertaining so much in a matter of 2 days), but this year, Josh's 20th high school reunion was the same weekend as Mother's Day, so the weekend before it was.  Well, shortly after sending out the invites, I received an email from one of the mom's of a boy in Avery's class saying that her son's (who was invited to Avery's party) was on the day of the party, so would be want to do a combined party at our house?  It worked out great!  Man - I'm telling you - splitting up responsibilities makes for a MUCH less stressful party - even if you do end up with 52 people at your house.  The weather was touch and go all week -including the morning of.  But, thankfully, by the time the party rolled around, it had stopped raining.  It was chilly, but no rain, so I was happy.  No rain, a bouncy house for the kids and booze and food for the parents = a great party!

 

 We were lucky enough to have Lindsey make the cakes again this year.  Wyatt requested a Scooby Doo cake and Lindsey found an idea for a rainbow cake, so she made that for Avery.  Aren't they incredible?  Scooby Doo  is actually all fondant.  So totally edible...And, the rainbow cake?  Rainbow all throughout!  Pretty impressive.

 

 

 So, Sunday was her party with Josh's family.  This is the party where I make her cake.  Why don't I make it for the kids party you ask?  A) I have way too many other things to prep for and I don't have time to spend on the cake, B) I don't feel like making one that is big enough for all of those people and C) I am not skilled in cake making like Lindsey is and I am not willing to risk the possibility of having to use things like coffee mugs to prevent the cake from falling in front of anyone else other than family....

 Yeah...as it turns out, when they say and 8 inch pain, they really mean that.  I however used a 9 inch pan and yet still cut off the same proportions on the top and on the bottom.  This clearly led to a purse that was too tall and too skinny.  But, cute nonetheless, right???  I also tend to keep the themed parties to the family, which is somewhat ridiculous given that clearly kids would get a bigger kick out of a Fancy Nancy party than adults, but seriously?  Do you know how expensive plates, napkins, balloons, etc. are for themed parties like that?  Not only that, but this gives me an excuse to use paper plates with the family so that A) they don't see the chips in my real plates and B) I don't have to wash them when we are done.  It also gives me an excuse to make adults wear ridiculous things on their heads, which I just find comical...clearly, as you can see in the picture, my brother in law doesn't find it quite as funny...

Grammy and Grampy got Avery a see saw, which as you can see was put to use immediately upon receiving it.  When I told someone about it, their first question?  Did Earle put it together?  HA!  They know us all too well.  But, no - this one, Grammy and Grampy actually put it together themselves. 

Onto the following week...Opa and Grandma came into town for Avery's actual birthday!  And, of course, you can't just do nothing on her actual birthday just because you have already had TWO parties at that point.  So? We had another party!  Grammy and Grampy came over that night again for dinner (ribs per Avery's request) and we let her open our present - her first (and most likely only given the cost of the thing) American Girl Doll - and my parent's present - a princess microphone which attaches to a CD player (or iPod) so that she can sing her favorite songs (really, really ,really loudly and really frequently).  Thanks, Opa and Grandma! 

Oh - and, just in case we forgot about Al during all of these Avery celebrations, he made sure we knew he was still around by taking EVERY single ball that he owns and throwing them around the yard.  It's amazing  how quickly he can distribute, yet how slowly he can pick them up...

And, the celebration continued on Friday...I took the day off of work and we all went to the zoo! Of course, first, we had to stop at Five Guys for a burger...

When we got to the zoo, one of the first things we saw was this crazy bird.  I've never seen anything like it - he saw the kids and immediately came over to the window and started pecking at their hands.  It was pretty cute.  The added bonus was that Avery actually remembered the bird later on when she saw a woman with really spiked, strange looking hair and commented that she looked exactly like the bird that we saw!  I have to admit - I was thinking the exact same thing...

 And, of course, the classic "Opa holding the kids up to see the animals" picture...

 And, the classic "kids sitting on the elephant statue" picture...

Now...onto a celebration for ME!  Well,not really.  As I mentioned earlier, it was Josh's 20th high school reunion on Saturday night, so I guess it was really more about him, but whatever.  I partook in the fun as well.  Given that we had 2 babysitters staying with us, we were able to take off and stay in Providence for the night!  Just to give you an indication of the fun that was had, these are the only two pictures of Josh and I that we have from the evening.  And, yes - that was a pitcher of margaritas, which I should not have even been looking at after the wine consumed earlier that evening - much less drinking.  Bad, bad decision on my part...

Needless to say, Mother's Day was a bit "low-key."  It involved a lot of relaxing on the deck, napping, walking on the beach and then finally a nice dinner, which Alex clearly enjoyed...

If you've actually made it this far and are not exhausted (or on the contrary - bored out of your mind), just imagine how it was actually living this week.  I'm spent.  However, not spent enough to be flying to Richmond, VA tomorrow morning at 7 am out of Logan (aka - waking up at 3 AM to leave at 4 AM to get to Logan by 6 AM - UGH!) to spend a weekend with 3 good college girlfriends. Stay posted my friends.  Stay posted...