Parkers 1st Birthday Party

Okay, since his party was fifteen days ago, I reckon I better get around to posting about it. The pictures will fill in most of the story.

My wife made a unique and very cute invitation for the gig. It was an elephant head cut from gray construction paper. Its ears folded over for mailing, but when opened its 'trunk' unfolded, accordian style, to reveal the party info:

Oh, in case you haven't figured it out, the theme was a 'jungle party'. I even ITuned a Jungle CD for the day.

The day of the party the Mrs. made 'swamp juice' made of green Kool-Aid made darker by blue food coloring, Sprite, and pineapple juice.

She also made party favors - 'bamboo sticks' of chocolate wafers with a nice thank you tag.

Here's his cake:

and the room, pre-party, decorated in part with Mylar balloons from a local store:

This is the cake table, with Ya-Ya's stuffed tiger as the center of attention:

Here's the birthday boy with his Godmother

here's the prize table for the animal bingo we played. There were some neat Africanesque items up for grabs.

Okay, in my family there's a tradition on 1st birthdays. You lay several items on the table in front of the kid - usually a shot glass, a rosary, money, and one or two other things. Whatever they grab allegedly tells you where the focus of their life will be. I wanted a pair of boxing gloves and something in line with being a ladies man, but no such luck - and the boy wound up grabbing the rosary anyhow - and the money.

Middle Child helped him blow out his candles:

And then it was his turn to eat cake. YaYa, on her 1st birthday, was disgusted by the idea of getting messy and refused to eat it at all; Middle Child dug right in. Parker walked a line between the two, hesitating before digging in, and then doing so gingerly.

Afterwards we opened a score of great presents (including lots of baseball clothing - funny, no one EVER gets him anything but baseball stuff. Odd how my obsession has just made the idea of a football or soccer themed shirt verbotten to my friends and family).

It was a good time, even if the fancydancy catering I ordered (and paid +$200 for) tanked.

Happy birthday Parker, we love you!

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