"Gretel Gumdrops"....The Birthday Girl!!

For Gretel's FIRST Birthday, I was really excited because my family came to visit the weekend of her special day!! So Gretel was able to celebrate with her G-rents Mimi and Pop-"C",Uncle Teal, and her Auntie Hab, Uncle Stevo, and cousins Hudson and Oliver!

For her party, I thought it would be fun to do a Hansel and Gretel theme! So I made these invitations, and the rest of the poem had the info about when & where...





Everyone visited and ate when they arrived. We had two different kinds of soups, salad, spinach & artichoke dip/bread, sugar cookies and cupcakes when we sang to Gretel and the end.
The little kids went in the backyard and sat on blankets while my mom read them the story of Hansel and Gretel. Then we had them go in the garage to help decorate the gingerbread house and color. I had lots of help from friends and family for the party, so thank you everyone, for everything you did to help me!!

My very talented friend Abby is an awesome artist, and spent TONS of time drawing the entire story of Hansel and Gretel to create a giant coloring page for the kids at the party. It was sooo nice of her-I only requested one scene, and she went above and beyond!!

So the kids really liked coloring and decorating the gingerbread house, and played a quick game of "Throw the witch in the cauldron."

We watched the video that Johnny made of Gretel's highlights of her first year, which turned out really fabulous and Gretel still loves watching it! (Thanks Johnny for all your hard work!) Then we sang to her, & took pictures. We gave each family a party favor cd named "Ear Candy" (thanks Hab for labeling and wrapping them!) which had songs from her video and candy themed songs on it.
It was a lot of fun-we're glad we have so many fun friends and fam to celebrate with!!

On Gretel's actual birthday, we started off the day with having her open some presents from my parents and Hailey, Steve, and their boys. Yay for new toys!! Thanks, everyone...

Then we spent the day at a pumpkin patch where they had lots of fun things for the kids to do, like train rides, slides, and a petting zoo!!

Johnny had to stay home and study, but in the end he decided to skip class and go birthday shopping for our little girl instead! We were glad he met us for dinner (at B.J.'s) that night, so he didn't miss out on the whole day!

Fun+Uncle=FUNCLE!!!

We came back after dinner and opened more gifties-a doll with a stroller and a little toy hair/makeup kit that Johnny had gotten her. She just loves this-she sits all day long opening and closing all the tiny nailpolish bottles, and rummaging around her bag for her makeup brushes!! (I wonder where she gets it from?) Her first word was "Baby" and she says it all day-so she really loves her little baby that cries and makes sleeping noises.

Thank you Mom and Dad for all the fun outfits, accessories, and cute jammies too!!