Ah, the birthday…more party pics!

Less talky, more showy. Most of these pics should explain themselves so I’ll try to refrain for blog chattiness…I said I’ll try :).

 

The inside of the deliciously awesome tie-dye cupcakes:

Adrianne’s mom (loving referred to as Mama Donna):

B loved her tutu I made for her. It was so easy to do and ended up looking perfect! I also made the “1” onesie but didn’t get a great pic of it…oh well!

Lovin’ on Daddy:

She wasn’t interested in her cake…until she turned it upside down (didn’t like the icing?? who’s child is this?? oh…one more way she’s like her Daddy)

Grammy cleaned her all off:

Pop letting her chew on stuff she’s not supposed to (that’s not a bad pic of the onesie…I outlined the “1” in silver fabric paint to match the little silver bows I put on her tutu):

This is a great pic of Jonathan with his parents (I can NEVER get a good pic of all of them ‘cause there’s always so much going on…I love this one!):

 

The boys making their tie-dye:

Annabelle helping Christy with her’s (Julie and I think she’s a little baby genius like Oliver!):

 

Loot, glorious loot! Let the Thank You cards begin…

Lovin’ the real cell phone Annabelle gave B in her special purse full of goodies:

The A Team (Annabelle and Abigail) looking very sneaky…I wonder what plans they’re hatching in those baby genius brains??

Sharing cake with Mommy:

The PERFECT book from Lyd and Oli! It made me tear up…

The PERFECT CD from Lyd and Oli! “Yo Gabba Gabba”, of course!

Me almost crying at this precious gift from Mama Donna. I had to hand it off to Jonathan to keep from crying! I’ll take a closer up pic later for you to see :)

Jonathan never likes to call her “Princess”, so Mama Donna and Miss Vicki gave her a crown…silly ladies!

More cake pics:

  

 

It was a wonderfully memorable day. Certainly worth the 3 hours of sleep I got the night before!!! I can’t wait to plan her 2nd birthday…

Dye-ing to Party!!!

Bridget’s birthday party was this past Saturday and it was pretty much all I’d dreamed it would be. Though I certainly enjoy my homebody time, I always love spending time with friends and often end up doing that at our place. When it comes to “organized Adamo events”, I often have big plans in mind and then realize how in over my head I’ve gotten myself. This party was no different because as soon as I’d thought of the Tie Dye Party, the ideas just kept flowing and I had to have it all!

I got some great ideas from blogs (invitations, cupcakes, photo print deals, tissue poms) as well as friends (cleaning service, free vinyl banner), but I’m also proud to say that I came up with some darn good ideas myself! Wahoo! My favorite? The party favors…every little friend that came got to dye their own shirt/onesie and take it home in their individual baggie with instructions for washing and wearing. It worked great (except that I forgot to tell people to wear gloves again at home to take the shirt out of the bag! Oops!).

Here are a few pics, though I plan on posting a couple more times about the party:

Thanks, Jill, for telling me about the free banner! It looked PERFECT!

 

We recycled Mandy’s wedding cupcake stand by covering it with brightly colored wrapping paper ($1.25 for 8 rolls at IKEA). It fit in just right!

I did my best to place a picture of all our party friends around the house so they’d have a pic of themselves to see (though I ran out of frames in the end and ran out of time to go buy more…but I tried!)

Tie-dye cupcakes (see a post soon with pics of the inside!)

My tissue poms were made with tissue from the Dollar Tree ($1 for 50 sheets) and ribbon scraps from Hobby Lobby ($1.99 for a bag of about 15 2-yd ribbon strips):

The tie-dye set up (thanks, Jill, for such great blog-ready pics!):

Me and the birthday girl! I’ll include more pics of the homemade tutu and onesie in a later post :)

Life #2: Year One

Well, this time last year I’d been full on pushing in my L & D room for an hour and still had another hour and 17 minutes to go. At this point, I clearly remember having thought for the first 30 minutes…”I’ve got this!”…the epidural numbness was even a little disappointing because I was so prepared for pain, however wasn’t feeing A THING. How foolish was I?

The second 1/2 hour found me thinking, “OK, now I’m starting to get a little tired. Let’s get to the end of this rodeo!”. By 11:00am, I was 100% asleep (if you’re aware, Jonathan was at Monica’s in Deep Ellum when I got my 1st contraction at 11:59pm, we went to the hospital at 2am and I got 2 hours of “sleep” the entire night after that – though I had the worst convulsing shivers from my epidural that sleep wasn’t really an option) and when it was time to push, Jonathan and the nurses (I had the most outstanding two-nurse team. They were opposites in their approach, which was so wonderful for me ‘cause I got to try different techniques) would wake me up and help…then I’d fall back asleep.

When I finally heard the word “vacuum” I was in heaven! They asked how I felt about it and I was like, “duh! get her out of here!” As soon as Dr. Ryder (my regular OB was sick but came up to see us the next day-wearing a surgical mask!) came in again, she popped that vacuum on B’s big head and out she slid…ah, sweet relief!!! I’ll never forget that feeling of relief, completion, accomplishment. Oh, and by that point they’d stopped replacing my epidural juice (my fancy name for it) so I was certainly not numb…and I’m thankful for that.

Her first picture:

First time Grandparents!:

How did I manage to look so awesome?? Hehehehe…:

Let the celebrations begin (My dad, Jonathan, Jonathan’s Dad, Bridget’s twin – Cory’s birthday is also September 7th!):

Snuggles (my little tree frog!):

More celebrations (we used our wedding day champagne glasses):

Anna, BC (that’s “before child”)

Thinking back to this time last year…

Next baby, I’m totally not starting my belly pics until I ACTUALLY have a belly :) Ah, novice mistake!

   

I couldn’t forget my pic, even though I was enjoying the beach in Hilton Head!

Look how little Penny is!

We took this right before going to dinner with Jonathan’s parents. I’d been “uncomfortable” for about 2 days but hadn’t had an single contraction (not even Braxton Hicks). Reasons why I convinced Jonathan to go to the jazz show at Monica’s that night. Of course, my first contraction came at 11:59pm and the following ones were less than 5 minutes apart. I never got the “gradual” labor like they describe in class! It’s just like everyone says, “All babies are different”…don’t we know it?!

She cares about the environment!

My little one has already started recycling! Now that we’re entering a new stage of development, she’s started using some of her old toys in new and inventive ways. A favorite? Her travel swing that used to sit ideally under the desk in her playroom. To think I almost put it in the attic! Check it out: