Happy Birthday Alexis!

5 years ago, we waited impatiently for Alexis to arrive. I was induced 11 days after my due date. But labor was very quick once started and time has sped forward ever since. In the movie "Click" Adam Sandler fast forwards through little things at first, but then he quickly is an old man and has missed his entire life including his children growing up. Today I wish I could use a pause button and just enjoy time as it is right now. But pretty quickly we will be adding number three and I am sure that will seem to bump up time again.

Anyway, the past few weeks I have enjoyed letting Alexis plan her own birthday party. The past two birthdays have been family parties at Grandma's house, which was great fun too. But we decided to go all out for #5 and invite friends, make invitations, party favors, the whole sha-bang. Santa brought her a tea set for Christmas and she wanted to have a tea party birthday. She chose Disney princess gift sacks and we made princess photo invitations online. She chose strawberry cake mix, so the cupcakes were pink with purple frosting and purple edible glitter (fancy sprinkles) to go on top. I bought one of those cute cupcake stands that I am sure we will use often. The party store in Orem has a huge variety of pinatas and they are $8 so I let her pick one out. She chose a strawberry and we had strawberry milkshakes with our cupcakes. Peach lemonade was what was served in the tiny teacups. We invited some friends from the neighborhood and some from preschool. With my two girls we had 8 kids total. Which her tea set had setting for 8. I would have liked to invite a few more friends, but 8 was a good number. She had a hard time narrowing down the guest list though. Her good friend Chase was the only boy, but he didn't seem to mind. When guests arrived, we decorated paper crowns and there was a special blue king's crown just for Chase. We bought a princess dominoe game at the dollar store that we attempted to play. But the peices were small and plastic and not too sturdy. Then had the tea party, opened presents and did the pinata. We actually almost ran out of time. Letting her plan it all was really fun for her and it was pretty easy preparation and clean up too. Her birthday was Martin Luther King Day and Greg had the day off, so that was a huge help. I also let her choose the meals for the day. We had breakfast burritos for breakfast, corn dogs for lunch and ordered in Chinese for dinner. It was a fun day and it was great to see her so excited. When everyone was singing Happy Birthday, she was a little embarrassed and couldn't stop giggling, it was very sweet. And everyone got a candle in their cupcake, because she didn't want anyone to feel left out.