Charlie's 3rd birthday party

Sunny days...sweeping the clouds away...

That's just what we had! We celebrated Charlie's 3rd birthday on Saturday, May 8th, and it was a beautiful day! The party this year was at our house (which meant my house got scrubbed instead of just cleaned). Since Charlie's present from both grandparents was a play structure in the backyard, we just decided the kids could run around in the backyard and play. And played they did! It seemed like they all had a ball! This was much easier on Daniel and me, in that we didn't have to worry about rain since we could just stay inside at the house. We didn't have to worry about renting the pavilion at the park. And, we weren't so spread out all over the park to where we couldn't enjoy our guests. I could actually decorate ahead of time and I didn't have to worry about the wind taking them down (like last year).

We had around 10 kids plus many adults. This was the perfect size for our backyard. We probably could have handled a few more but it was nice to have room to really run around. The kids naturally migrated to the playground. The bubbles were a big hit as well. The adults were able to just hang out on the new deck and relax as the kids played. Here are some pics from the day...

Charlie's party theme (if you didn't already figure it out) was Sesame Street. Charlie loves all the characters, especially Elmo. So, it was an obvious choice for his birthday. I always have a hard time finding exactly the decorations I want so I usually end up making them. This year was no different. I did find a Sesame Street backdrop that worked perfectly on the wall in our living room. I borrowed a friend's Cricut machine and cut out a million ABC's and numbers. They were stuck all over the walls in the living room, the dining room and even coming up the stairs. I did buy a few things in the theme and they were spread around to pull everything together. I printed some characters and cut those out as well. For some reason, I didn't get many pictures of the decorations but did manage a couple...

The cake was the main attraction. My sister always makes Charlie's cakes and this year she outdid herself. I had found an idea online to do character cupcakes with a small center cake. She definitely delivered and provided exactly what I had in my head. Except, I think it turned out better than the picture I had in my head. See for yourself...

I also found an idea online for party favors. I was trying to do something that didn't cost me much money and wasn't the little trinket stuff we always get. The party favors were iced cookies in the shape of the letter C and the number 3. The packaging said, "This party was brought to you by the letter "C" and the number "3". " I thought they turned out really cute!

After the party was over, Charlie opened presents from family. He got great gifts! A couple of the favorites were the golf set and the ambulance and helicopter that light up and make sounds. You'll see many other favorites in the pics. It was such chaos of flying tissue paper and wrapping paper that I have no clue who each of the gifts are from! Talk about a hard time coming with thank you cards! We asked the guests of the party not to buy Charlie gifts but instead to make a donation to his school. Charlie is blessed with many things, as are the rest of us, and we just wanted to extend those blessings to others instead of keeping them for ourselves. Charlie was still bombarded with gifts from family though...

We had a great day celebrating with family and friends! We are truly blessed to have such a great family and such great friends. We had many that couldn't make it to the party and they were definitely missed. Thank you to all who celebrated this milestone with us!