Lump's 1st Birthday Party - the Prep Work :)

Realistically, the next two subjects will require a few posts so we'll start with something simple.

We were in danger of royally screwing up Lump's 1st birthday. We've been busy all summer and with four kids things slip by your attention. With just over two weeks left until the gala we didn't have invitations, a theme, or even a place to hold the event.

The last thing we wanted to do was host the party at the same-old, same-old place, and themes were hard to come by. We'd done Chuck E. Cheese for YaYa, a circus complete with real clown for LuLu, and a jungle theme for Smiley. What was left?

I came up with the idea for a teddy bear picnic and Lisa dug the idea enough to get her Martha Stewart going.

We went to a bunch of different party supply stores, eventually settling on a color scheme of yellow (not our favorite, but plentiful).

I love this next pic, which was taken at Winkies in Whitefish Bay. Of note from that trip was a short road-rage incident in the parking lot, with Lisa and the female driver both exchanging words as they got out of their cars.  Lisa was in the right, the other driver was an ass, and yes, the other person started it. Just for the record.

We found a teddy bear pinata for a baby's birth that we modified for Lump.

We bought a huge bag of candy for the pinata but Smiley raided it in the night, eating a ton and successfully hiding much of the rest like a squirrel fearful of winter.

From the dollar store we picked up teddy bears with the intention of ripping a stitch and removing the stuffing, then doing a 'Build a Bear' of sorts at the party. That proved impractical and we instead picked up outfits for each of the bears as a party gift.

But we still needed a place. Hardees has a great playarea but traditionally we do the burger thing for the 2nd birthday, not the first. We stopped at a bar in South Milwaukee to view its hall; we liked it, but the cost is more First Communion than birthday.

In the end we went with the same old same old as a venue.

The invitations were another saga as we couldn't find any teddy-bear themed pre-printed cards .I guess teddy bears are out this year; it doesn't matter. Within a year it'll be hot. We always ride ahead of the fashion curve.

 I picked up some Care Bear invitations but they weren't going to fly. So after an arduous trip to Michael's Lisa stamped her own invites and added little teddy bears to the front of them all. Sadly I screwed up the count and not all of them were mailed when Smiley and I took the trip to the post office. I had to phone some folks to fill them in on details.

NOTE: TO ANYONE WHO RECEIVED ONE, LET ME BORROW IT TO SCAN IT AS I CANNOT LOCATE OUR COPY.

Remind me  to add a pic of that to the blog, ok?

Anyhow, after that we almost forgot the food and at the last minute (20 hours in advance) we ordered pasta, salad, and breadsticks for 40 from Pizza Hut.

Whew. And then it was on with the show.