It's a Ladybug Birthday Party

Zoey celebrated her first birthday on November 5th. It's hard to believe that it has already been one year. Time flies so fast when you have a little one!!!!

I decided on a ladybug theme for Zoey's party around the time she was 4 months old and have been planning it in my head every since. LOL!

Above is the invitations that we sent out. In late September I took Zoey to Inniswood Metro Park and did a ladybug photo shoot in her Halloween costume. I took approximately 130 pictures and then had to narrow it down to my favorites, which was not an easy task. All in all I was very happy with the way the photo shoot went and how the invitations turned out.

In terms of decorations for the party, I decided that I wanted to keep with the traditional red and black ladybug rather than the pink and black ones that are out there. This made things a little bit frustrating at times, but I'm glad I did.

I kept things pretty simple. I bought some wooden lady bugs at Hobby Lobby which marched across the cupboard. We hung up some red and black streamers. I bought the Zoey sign from a seller on Etsy. The other decorations came in the form of favors and the food, as well as a few balloons.

I also made a photobook on Shutterfly of Zoey's first year for the guests to look through. The plan was going to be for each guest to sign the inside cover of the book, but we kind of forgot to have them do that.

In terms of food, I had a really difficult time finding ladybug themed items. I ended up going with just snacky type things. I made various types of pinwheel roll ups and then made ladybug cards for them identifying what was what. I ordered some miniature ladybug sugar cookies from a seller on Etsy. I found ideas on line for ladybug crackers and ladybug bagel bite pizzas. Then I had a simple meat, cheese, and cracker tray, spinach dip and bread, and Scott's mom made a fruit salad.

Now the cake is where I spent the most thought and planning. Scott would probably say I was obsessed with the cake. Originally I was going to have the lady who made our wedding cake make Zoey's cake because our wedding cake was SO good. However, I didn't think I could justify the $350 she quoted me on a birthday cake, so we went with Scott's second favorite cake, Sam's Club. I had them do a marble cake with white frosting and a red border. I think they thought I was crazy for ordering a cake and then not having them do anything with it, but I had a plan of my own. I ordered a ladybug made from gum paste from a seller on Etsy, as well as some stars in red and black. I used stickers to spell out Zoey on the stars and my friend Heather did the grass around the ladybug and all of the finishing details. It turned out super cute if I do say so myself.

I found the idea online for Zoey's smash cake, and my wonderfully talented friend, Heather, made it for me. It turned out so cute. The picture doesn't really even do it justice.

I'd say that all in all it was a pretty successful 1st Birthday party. Now to the next exciting year to come :)

Zoey's First Halloween

Zoey was a ladybug for her first Halloween. I think she probably wore her costume more than any other outfit she has ever had. Her theme for her birthday was ladybugs, so she wore it for a ladybug photo shoot we did for her invitations.

We then dressed her up and took her to Boo at the Zoo. I think this event may become a tradition, but needs to wait until she is a little bit older. I see that it has a lot of potential for older kids, but it was too dark to see any of the zoo animals, which is the reason we took Zoey. They also have a maze and kids haunted house that I think could be a good time for her when she is older.





The next Halloween event we did was Trick or Treat at Grammy's retirement home. There were tons of kids there, so Zoey got a little overwhelmed, but she handled it well. She got to go back to Grammy's apartment where Grammy gave her an awesome play house as her Halloween treat. Zoey loves that little house. She also got to wear Grammy's witches hat.

A couple of days before Halloween, we got around to carving the pumpkin Zoey picked out earlier in the month when we went to the pumpkin patch. Zoey was very interested in watching Scott carve the pumpkin and she loved playing wi the guts. I think Scott did a pretty good job with the pumpkin considering he hasn't carved a pumpkin in a very long time.

On the actual day of Halloween, we took Zoey over to Aunt Phyl's house and skipped actual trick or treat. Zoey is too young for any candy, so it seemed kind of pointless.

Starting Fresh

Zoey will be a year old tomorrow and in the time I have been doing this family blog, I have not done such a great job at keeping it up to date. So I've decided that rather than try to catch up on the blog posts I should have written in September and October, I am just going to start fresh. In reality nothing too big happened. I think the most significant thing was that my best friend, Amanda, and her boy, Colin, came for a visit. It was a good time and having Colin around seemed to give Zoey the inspiration needed to start scooting. Since then she has been constantly on the move. She still isn't really crawling, but does scoot like crazy and is now an expert at pulling herself to standing and cruising along the couch.

I will hopefully have a few minutes to do a post on Halloween sometime later tonight. I will eventually get around to updating Zoey's reading list because it is three books behind, plus quite a few shorter books we have acquired.