A Whole Hand Old

I cannot believe Rowen turned FIVE years old last week...a whole hand old, just crazy!  Now that she's older, its fun to interview her each year on her birthday. Check it out...

How old are you:  Five 

What grade are you in: Kindergarten (hands go in the air)!

Favorite Color:  Purple & Pink

What is your favorite animal: dog

What is your favorite Book: Amelia Badelia 

Favorite TV show: Team Umizoomi

Favorite movie: Moana (shocker)

Where do you want to go on vacation: to see the beach

What is your favorite drink: water

What is your favorite breakfast food: French Toast Sticks or egg sandwich or pancakes

What is your favorite food:  Ham and Cheese sandwich

Where is your favorite place to go: The Buffalo Restaurant (aka Buffalo Wild Wings)

Favorite snack: Fruit snacks

Favorite outfit: dress or Moana shirt

What do you like to take to bed with you at night: Froggy

What's your favorite game: Moana necklace game

Favorite toy:  ipad (mom cringes)

Who is your best friend: Aubrey

What is your favorite thing to do inside: watch tv and play with my brother

Favorite thing to do outside: wiggle car or swim or play with corbin and carver, lol

Favorite holiday: Christmas

What do you want to be when you grow up: Singer

We celebrated her actual birthday (Thursday) at home with gifts and donuts.  Then, spent all day Sunday afternoon with her friends at an adorable art studio in Grimes for a painting party, and ended the day celebrating with family at our house!

Rowen definitely has some big changes coming her way in a few weeks when kindergarten starts, but I know she's gonna do wonderful!  Happy Birthday, baby girl, we love you!

Rowen Turns 3!

I promised last week that I’d have a re-cap of Rowen’s birthday on the blog, but that didn’t happen, sorry.  Finally getting around to it now though! 

Last year, we did one party with both family and a few friends, but this year we split it up and did two...a “friend party” and a “family party”, I’ll start with the “friend party”…

Guests: Over the past year we’ve gotten to know a few of our neighbors really well - so well in fact, that the kids request to play with each other all the time!  So we thought what the heck, invite 15 kids and their parents and see what happens!  We busted out the inflatable pools, sprinkler, slip ‘n slide and water tables and had ourselves a big ol' backyard bash!  Thank goodness for the water because it was HOT, but the kids loved it!

Theme: Naturally, the theme of the party was "princesses".  Specifically, Ariel and Sofia, which are Rowen’s two most favorite princesses!  I even decided to dress the part.  When I walked downstairs that morning wearing THIS, Rowen’s jaw just about hit the floor.  “Mom, Ariel is on your shirt, Ariel is on your shirt!”, she yelled.  Totally worth it!

(for those of you asking, I found the tank here, and for the record, no I was NOT wearing the matching undies, ha!)

Confession: I took a bunch of décor pictures, but then accidentally deleted them when I was going through my iPhone later that night (whoops).  

Food: I don’t know about you, but every year around mid-July, Ryan and I get really barbecue-d out.  Not sure why, but for some reason we get to a point where a grilled hamburger or hot dog no longer sounds appetizing.  So instead of grilling, we decided to do walking tacos!  Talk about an easy, fairly inexpensive meal idea --- they were a hit as was the rest of the party!  A big thanks to all of our friends for celebrating with us!

**

The next morning we woke up early and headed to Panora where we met up with family.  We decided to do this party out at the lake to give everyone on my side of the family a day of boating and tubing!  There was no real theme, just a few balloons and some festive tableware, our view of the lake itself was decoration enough! 

We ate sandwiches and cake, boated, tubed, and opened gifts! It was relaxing and fun, a big thanks to my in-laws for hosting! 

The rest of the weekend was spent playing with all the new toys Rowen received (pretty sure we now own every single Ariel and Sofia toy known to man).  

Monday was Rowen's actual birthday!  It was rainy so we decided to travel north to Ames to check out the library (locals:  this place is awesome for kids) and have lunch at one of our favorite restaurants, Hickory Park, where she got a free ice cream and a birthday song!  

What a fun-filled, party hardy weekend it was!

Rowen's Elephant Party!

Our sweet, silly, little girl turned two years old last Sunday! 

There is not much I love more in this world than a birthday party, especially a well-planned themed party!  For the past month I’ve been planning an elephant theme for her second birthday!  I wanted to incorporate some of Rowen’s favorite things at her party, which just happened to include elephants, cake, cookies, hot dogs, and swimming!

Here are a few shots of all the cuteness…

The invitations:  If you've been following my blog, you know that I also do a little graphic design on the side of my everyday job.  Well, this summer I have been slammed with weddings I am designing for and (as bad as it sounds) just didn't have the time to do Rowen’s invitations, too.  So instead, I thought I’d go online and give another designer a chance at some business!  Within minutes of looking, I found these adorable invitations and just couldn't pass them up! 

Party Location:  Unlike last year, we decided it would be much easier to host the party in our own home.  However, the main floor of our house wasn't big enough to comfortably hold 30+ people so we decided to cross our fingers for good weather and have the majority of the party outside in the backyard.  It was hot out that day, but luckily there was a good breeze to help keep everyone cool!

The Guests: The guest list included aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents, great grandparents and a few of Rowen’s little friends from daycare!

The Decor:  To keep it girly, I went with a teal, pink and gray color palate.  A majority of the decorations inside were focused on and around the cake table.  To start, I purchased cheap gray tablecloths and hung an adorable pink, gray and teal banner that read “Happy Birthday”.  I also utilized the chicken wire frame (a DIY project I did a few months ago) we have hanging on our dining room wall as the backdrop to display a “number 2” sign I made along with some recent pictures of the birthday girl!    

Scattered throughout the main floor of the house were teal, pink and gray balloons and few gray pom-poms.  I also hung this adorable elephant garland over the fireplace.

Outside in the front yard, the guests were greeted at door with this cute sign, which matched the invitations. 

Out back, where the majority of the party was being held, were a few tables decorated with gray tablecloths and a jar of peanuts as centerpieces.  We also hung a few paper lanterns, too!  For the kids at the party, we busted out the inflatable pool and filled it with lots of fun toys as entertainment – so easy!

The Food:  It was Ryan’s idea to do a hot dog bar!  I was originally just thinking of doing a grill out, but when Ryan suggested his idea, I was instantly on-board!  We had a variety of different toppings, which were a hit with the guests!   

For dessert there was cake, ice cream and chocolate chip cookies!  I ordered a simple marble flavored sheet cake designed to match her invitations…so cute!

The afternoon was spent eating, and opening gifts!

It was a great day shared with close family and a few of Ro's spunky little friends!  Rowen is truly a blessed little girl! 

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