Starr turns 1!

Starr turned 1 on Saturday and we celebrated G-Man turning 3 (On June 8th). It was a whirlwind day and I am sad that it has passed us so quickly. Our little Starr has brought our family full circle. She is feisty, sweet, determined, strong willed, tough, silly, and smart.Grayson is such a big boy. He is smart, funny, athletic, energetic, kind, thoughtful, and a bit fiery himself at times, too. He has grown from baby to big brother to independent little man much too quickly.

Perfect Family Photo: G-man never does a forced pose, Starr clearly has water in her ear, Hubster is smiling, Mama is smiling while trying to tickle G-man's knee to obtain a smile if even forced.

We celebrated the little's party at a YMCA Aquatic Center for an afternoon of water play and good company. The adults enjoyed their time and the kids had a blast. It wasn't the perfect day in the sense of a bright sun and no clouds. Nope. It was a perfect day because even though it was overcast, it was warm but not too hot. It was windy but not rainy and chilly. We were surrounded by so much love for our children, for us and our family. Words could never express how blessed and grateful I feel. We were late because it was a 30 minute drive for us to get there and we had too much to do in the morning but despite being late, finding out when I arrived that I had no space left for photos on my phone and a bit flustered setting up I decided to just be and let be on Saturday. (This is a new practice of mine and it does take work!) Though Saturday it was a little easier. With a happy and grateful heart I share with you a glimpse of our perfect day!

I already posted about the invites but in case you missed it check out my previous post.
The pics are what we have to work with now because I haven't received them all from everyone and wasn't able to take any myself. I will probably add/update as I receive others.

Party Decor : Simple

A yellow table cloth on a table provided for the favors and gifts. A bundle of balloons on either side (which all popped by the end of the party). A centerpiece that didn't stay put because of the wind made by a crafty shop on Etsy. I took an empty glass jar and super glued blue ribbon to the top and then tied tweed around the front to spruce it up a little.

Ended up being primarily the cake topper

Used an extra bucket for forks and napkins

The Favors : Sand Buckets 

We filled sand buckets with two shovels (one already attached to handle - For $1 btw and one extra placed inside), goldfish snacks, bubbles, a lollipop, beach ball, and fish Food (M&M's). I just filled a little cup with M&M's wrapped with cellophane bag and tied with tweed. I made a little tag that stated it was Fish Food. As previously noted in past posts, I am no Martha Stewart. I have no fancy scrap-booking machine that cuts my paper perfectly. I don't even have a colored printer to have printed the images and wording on my tags. I did everything old school style with my fabulous penmanship and artistry skills. (Well, I think it was fabulous and that's all that counts, right!) I wrote the names of each of the littles on the front of the bucket with a sharpie. Then adhered a little foam fish sticker for extra pizazz! I made my favor tags out of foam bookmarks with foam stickers and foam markers. I simply wrote, "Thanks for Swimming love Grayson & Starr." I decorated them with little foam fish then tied onto the shovel inside the bucket.

Mama's big helper

For the big kids we did a small blue pail with Fish Bait (Gummy Worms) , Fish Food (M & M's) and Swedish Fish

All the goodies inside

The finished favor

 The Food: Pizza and Cake

For the cake my friend Paisley over at An Extra Ingredient did a two tier rainbow cake with bluish ruffles on the outside. We used the centerpiece sticks that wouldn't stay put as toppers and had a #1, #3, & sparkler candles on top and around. The candles didn't stay lit because of Mother Nature blowing her whispers into the universe, but we still sang and let G-man take the action of blowing out the candles. Paisley also did fishy cake pops for the littles. So Cute! We had pizza and cake and that was a wrap.

Taste the colors of the rainbow

The littles were exhausted from swimming

It was a great afternoon with some of our closest friends and family. The kids were exhausted but awoke in time to rip open their gifts. Actually, G-man did all the ripping for both of them. We did Starr's smash cake on Sunday prior to Nana leaving. She screamed the whole time we sang due to no nap. The tears subsided once she dug into that sugary sweet cake from Publix. In my book we had the perfect weekend. Our next adventure will be celebrating G-Man turning 3 this weekend!