birthday #3

Jed had a birthday a few weeks ago, and it's hard to believe that he is 3 years old already!

When I looked on Pinterest to get ideas for his birthday party, he watched over my shoulder and got SO excited every time a picture of Thomas the Tank Engine came up. That was clearly the theme of choice, so I went with that. Jed and I put his birthday on his wall calendar, as well as the day of his (first) birthday party, so we could count down to them. He was really excited every day to be one day closer to "cupcake day" (Saturday) and his birthday (Sunday).

Saturday the 24th we had a party with just a few friends from church - the Dixons, the Ormsbys, and the Wisers. There were 3 kids besides Jed, and that was a good number. I set out most of the snacks in little aluminum containers and lined them up on some of Jed's train tracks like a train, with some toy engines at the front.

I sent Scott and Jed out Saturday morning to put helium in some balloons at Party City. As a bonus, I had Scott buy Jed a mylar Thomas balloon - which Jed thought was the coolest and most exciting thing ever. While they were gone, I set up the food and some other decorations (I wanted most of them to be a surprise). I put Jed's toy engines inside the Tidmouth Sheds that I had made from a cardboard box as a backdrop, and added the helium balloons when Scott and Jed returned.

But my pride and joy was the cupcake train, cruising on a safari filled with random animals and not-to-scale foliage:

One of the presents that Jed got on Saturday was a hat that looks like Daniel Tiger. He liked it (though he's not much into wearing hats or coats these days), but I thought it was the coolest thing ever. 

On his way to church Sunday morning

Sunday afternoon we had another party for him, this time with the St. Clairs, and Grandpa Hat and Grandma Debbie. The decorations were the same, except that the helium balloons (save for Thomas) had all sunk to the ground overnight. Jed was a little traumatized Sunday morning when we woke up and all 10 balloons in his bedroom were suddenly on the floor, and not on the ceiling where they had been when he went to sleep the previous night. I made new cupcakes for the second party and we did the same cupcake train as Saturday. Jed once again sang "Happy Birthday" to himself loudly and blew out his candles enthusiastically.

By the end of the second celebration, Jed was completely worn out and over-partied. He went to sleep quickly and slept well Sunday night!