Party it up Pups.

  The kids are exactly 2 years and 6 weeks apart and last year after planning a spectacular My Little Pony party, I was too exhausted to do anything for Noah so for his birthday, we took him to a movie and he got a bag of popcorn. He was still happy and it doesn’t matter because he was 2 and he doesn’t remember anything. I could of told him we took him to Disneyland and just forgot the camera for pictures and he wouldn’t know the difference.  But anyways,  this year I got the igneous idea that I will just combine the kid’s birthday party because the thought of doing 2 parties so close together was just too exhausting to fathom. And don’t tell Noah but he doesn’t really have any of his own friends, they are all Natallie’s friends that just seem to like him too.

After I convinced the kids that a Princess-Batman party would be too creepy, the kids decided on Paw Patrol instead.  This was back in January so I had 8 months to plan and that’s also about how long it took for my online order of Paw Patrol mini figures took to ship over from China.

For Noah's 1st birthday I painstakingly made tractor shaped sugar cookies and I swore I would never attempt themed based sugar cookies again but in a moment of idiocy, I promised Natallie that yes, I could make dog boned shaped sugar cookies with each of the Paw Patrol pup colors. Why ?! Why do I subject myself to these things? After finally finding a dog bone cookie cutter,  making two failed recipes,  dashing to the store for more eggs and burning my arm with the hot cookie tray, I had lovely dog-bone shaped cookies ready for icing. However, the icing did not prove to be any easier. I quit after the icing was running everywhere and I dyed arm hands and part of the kitchen counter blue with food coloring. I quit after that. The kids can decorate their own stupid cookies at the party.  If I ever decide to make themed sugar cookies again,  please hit me in the head with a frying pan. But I have to admit, even though I wasn't able to do cookies in all the pup colors, just the blue cookies looked pretty cool coupled with the red dog dish I found at the dollar store.

 I like planning parties but unlike Natallie, I lack patience and precision so I loathe things like intricate cookie decorating or piping delicate cupcake designs. Simon must of seen me in the kitchen with my ziplock bag of icing and starring at the 40 cupcakes in the kitchen that needed to be iced. I must of had the I-hate-my-life look on my face because he said, "it's just like caulking. I use a caulking gun at work all the time." And who knew that his skills from the construction site would transfer to mad skills to icing cupcakes for your kids' birthday. Simon didn't do just a decent job, he iced the cupcakes a million times better than I could. And the kids were more than happy to help lick the beater and the spoons with all the extra icing.

It didn't take long to set up all the Paw Patrol awesome-ness and we were ready to have a PAW-TY!

The party was a blast. My ingenious plan to not ice the rest of those stupid cookies turned out to be a fun activity for the kids.

It wasn't a super hot day but that didn't seem to stop the kids from playing in the spray park. I was in denial that it was the end of summer and didn't bring any warm clothes for my kids so they were shivering at the end. Oh well, they had eaten so much sugar it kept them running like maniacs to keep warm.

We had the music pumping and the kids (well at least mine) were showing off their bizarre dance moves.  They must get it from Simon because I did not teach them those moves.  

It was also a pleasant surprise that the kids were totally into the party games this year. Last year when I tried to orchestrate a relay race with a group of mostly 3-4 year olds, it was just a mass exodus of small people running everywhere but this year, the kids understood that they couldn't run until the person in front passed them the dog bone and it was a lot of fun. We also did a relay race with Paw Patrol masks which the kids thought was hilarious. The most entertaining game was Skye, Skye, Chase (Duck, Duck, Goose). Some of the kids still didn't understand the game and would just run around in continuous circles but it made for a really good laugh for all the parents watching.

 One thing I didn't count on was how incredibly difficult it would be to light a sparkler candle when it was slightly cold and windy.  One candle finally got lit but blew out before we could even assemble anyone to start singing Happy Birthday. It took all the dads at the party , 2 entire packs of matches and finally lighting some wrapping paper on fire to light the second pack of sparkler candles I brought. Oh well,  it was pretty entertaining just to watch all the dads trying working on it.

Thank you for everyone who came, played, danced, ate and gifted the kids with presents. I'm exhausted but it was totally worth it. I'm also really glad that I am not doing this again for another 365 days.