So, a baby’s first birthday is, for a lot of Moms, a time to hit up Pinterest for ideas on cakes, decorations, favours, snack trays and I’m sure so much more that all follow some specific theme. Because we all want our child’s first birthday to be extra memorable, right? Because they are going to remember it, right? Well, I am not one of those Moms. With our daughter, I went to the dollar store and bought some generic birthday decorations, plastic table cloths and a number 1 candle. I also ordered a Minnie Mouse cake using a gift certificate my mother bought at an auction (read: it didn’t cost me anything). I did pick up some party favours since I knew there would be some kids who are used to going to parties and getting favours, but nothing themed and nothing that took me any time. I threw the little plastic toys and stickers into very generic bags and set them out on the table. There was no theme, just a bunch of people getting together for cake. I also did a cake smash photo shoot for her because they look like fun and a great way to preserve that first taste of cake. I should also mention that we ended up postponing her first birthday party for six months because of snow storms, but we still had it because every child deserves a first birthday party, no matter how simple it is.
Lily’s Cake Smash
For our second child, I decided that I was going to go even simpler! We still did the cake smash photos, but we did them outside because who cares if cake gets smeared all over the grass, it will just wash away or the birds and bugs will eat it. And for the party, we will meet people somewhere in public where we will have to clean up, but there wont be as much to clean up, and we can just leave when it’s done. A picnic party, perfect for a summer birthday. This also means, no decorations, no party favours, just snack trays and cake. So simple, how could this go wrong? Well, it could rain, then we could need to come up with an alternate location, and that alternate location could end up being our house. This is what happened, we had this birthday party in our house. It was a rather small gathering in comparison to our first child’s, but there was cake and there were snacks. No decorations, although I do still have the dollar store birthday banner from Lily’s first birthday, just people and food. And do you know what? It was just as nice as Lily’s first birthday party. And, much less stressful, I can’t imagine if I had been up all night for weeks on Pinterest trying to make his birthday perfect. What does it matter anyway? He won’t remember the details, all he will remember are the photos and the stories.
Henry’s Cake Smash