Party Time

Most of the family was out of town for a Scentsy Convention during Sidney's birthday week so we decided to have a birthday party focused on her friends.  When asked for the theme, Sidney shouted Dora and Boots!  We worked on the posters, see earlier blog, ordered Dora themed paraphernalia, and of course ordered a birthday cake with Dora on it.  The night before, after Sidney went to bed we set about decorating and finishing our paintings.  I love that Nathan wanted to document the process!

We got smart this year and pushed the table against the wall.  We had to attach streamers to the light fixture because I kept banging my head on it.

Here I am taping and pinning balloons to the wall.  Check out my awesome pants (sidebar!).  They were a $1 from Goody's back in the day when my old roommate worked there.  They're the most comfortable piece of clothing I own.  Not cute, but sooooo comfy!

We were up till 1:00 prepping for the party.  It started at 10:30 in the morning the next day.  Needless to say I didn't get much sleep since I had to get up early to finish.  Totally worth it.  As noted earlier, Sidney was blown away by her party transformation when she got up in the morning.  After breakfast, we had to go and pick up the cake.  I spent more time prepping and planning for her cake than I did my wedding cake.  I had finally chosen a place that said they could do what I wanted: Dora and her friends drawn on a two tier half/half (per Sid's request) of vanilla and chocolate, with the party colors, and the other main characters  This is what we got.

.  Seriously???  As you can tell by the picture, the top layer is sliding off of the bottom.  Where are the characters, the colors, I mean come on!  I decided not to get upset over it.  There was no way I was going to let a cake ruin the day.   We just made a joke out of it!  Everyone was blown away by the sheer awfulness of the decorations on it.  Many thought it was Boots, or Dora with a mustache, or my personal favorite Mario from Super Mario Brothers.

Our friend Matt gave her a low, New Yorker accent, that sounded like it belonged to a stinky taxi driver.  He kept saying, "Hi, I'm Dora.  You want some of my cake."  I cried from laughing so hard.  Sidney now thinks Dora has a mustache and it's one of her favorite things to do is to put her finger under her nose and say Dora Mustache.
At the party I had to let the teacher in me out and we did a craft.  I made pre-bagged supplies of stickers, construction paper, and colors.  I stapled paper plates together with beans in them to make tambourines.  Nathan thought it was a crazy idea, but I think it turned out well!

We had to play pin the tail on Swiper.  Nick Jr. has a great site with lots of freebies you can print out.  Check it out here if you ever need anything.

Our first volunteer, jumped up super fast to play.  The girls aren't sure what's going on.

Sidney didn't want to wear the blindfold.  She's the birthday girl, she "does what she wants!"  

Sidney looked at me like, why are you spinning my friend around?  Take that thing off of her!

Chaz needed some help from Daddy to keep the blindfold on.  I love that his body language appears to be so focused on getting the tail in the perfect spot.  On one of her BFF's turns, she totally missed so Sidney moved it in the right spot for her.  Swiper ended up with all of his tails.

Next came cake!  Sidney got some help from Daddy on the candles!

I love that she finally got her half half cake she had been wanting all summer.  I do believe she enjoyed it even though it wasn't the prettiest cake on the planet.  I love my Sidney more than anything in the world.  Thank you to all of our friends and family who shared this special day with us.  You mean so much to us and we love you dearly.  To those who couldn't be there, we love you too!