caroline's birthday party: what a zoo!

we did indeed have a "roaring good time" at caroline's birthday party a couple of weeks ago! caroline is so fascinated with animals these days, especially giraffes and elephants and lions (and tigers and bears! oh my!)... so i could think of no other way to celebrate our little monkey's birthday than with a zoo party! i turned to my trusty birthday party website to find more than enough fun ideas for a great evening. (my mom first found this site while searching for ideas for ethan's 2nd birthday cake, and i have depended on this site for birthday ideas ever since!) ok, back to the party... nana and pappy were so gracious to open their home for caroline's little shin-dig, and they just smiled as we hung animals all over the place!

my favorite decoration was the silly monkeys! kristie and another sweet friend of mine helped me create these goofy monkeys during a girls' craft night at heather's. i am SO GLAD they helped!!! this bay window in nana's dining room was the perfect spot for the monkeys to hang out. don't you just want to give them a banana?!


as our friends and family entered "the zoo", they walked through trees filled with snakes, and they also passed by the bird exhibit. near the feeding station, the animals had sabotaged the "please don't feed the animals" sign by crossing out "don't"! the feeding station was full of food that the animals like to eat (see a little further down for a closer look.). even the zookeepers had a snack. :) i found the fun colorful animal print balloons at oriental trading company... i was originally thinking about using traditional animal colors, like b&w for zebras, orange & black for tigers, etc... but i was so happy to find these for a GIRLY zoo party! of course, the package came with a ton of balloons, so we left the extras all over the floor for the crazy animals to play with!


here's a closer look at the feeding station. for those of you trying to figure out what the animals eat, i'll give you a little lesson on animal diets:
monkeys eat bananas, zebras eat hay, elephants eat peanuts, bears eat fish, zookeepers eat doritos :), giraffes eat trees, birds eat seeds, and lions & tigers eat... well, other animals!


caroline's cake was sweet and simple this year. we found all these cute ideas for monkey cupcakes, etc. etc., but i shocked my mom by asking her to just make a cake with some dots and told her we'd stick some animals on it! (miracles do happen!!) i thought it turned out great! and so did caroline. :) she loved looking at all the animals on her cake, and her friends loved helping her pick them off!


the grandmothers' wardrobes also added to the zoo decorations! here they are in their animal prints... beverly (our adopted mimi!) in leopard print, cindy as a black panther, gram wearing zebra print, and nana in snakeskin. :)


as caroline's friends arrived, they were told that the animals were loose all over the zoo and that we needed their help finding them! the kids had fun "catching" the animal stickers in their zookeeper bags...avery even figured out that some animals hide between rocks! :)


the kids would have been completely content running around the "zoo grounds" playing with striped and spotted balloons the whole night... but we had a couple more games to play! we played animal action, where the kids pretended to be different animals... this was a hoot, but i didn't factor in the reality that i couldn't crawl around on the floor very easily with the kids to show them what to do!! so heather came to my rescue and was a GREAT animal trainer!! :) can you guess what animals the kids are imitating below?!


the hit of the night (i think, anyway!) was the zebra parade!! the daddies didn't know what they were getting into when they showed up at this zoo party, but they were really good sports about being dressed up as zebras! each family was given a roll of toilet paper and black streamers to create a zebra, as well as zebra ears (yes, the grown men wore headbands!). it was hilarious watching everyone create these animals... i think the adults had more fun than the kids!


in the end, we ended up with some very unique looking zebras... jeff won the prize for "mummy zebra", and jonathan was "zebra most likely to one day be in charge of the zoo". aaron was decorated by his talented wife and the also very talented cindy, so he won "most artistic zebra". and brian...well, brian didn't get a prize. we decided that brian looked more like a zebra who'd been attacked by a wildebeest!

here are the good sports:
jonathan, brian, jeff (under there somewhere!), and aaron

caroline had fun opening her gifts...and eating them too! :) we gave caroline a little kitchen for her birthday (more on that later), so everybody gave caroline food and cookin' stuff! ethan was just as excited about it as the birthday girl! look at his expression on the edge of this first picture. :) then you can see caroline feasting on the cute felt food heather made for her! (in that picture, she's digging into a yummy soft hamburger with all the fixins!)



and now for the cake! caroline was talking about her cake all day... actually all week! she could not wait to blow these candles out!



caroline did not want to wait for plates and forks to start digging in to the icing! hmmm, i wonder where she gets that!?!?


"who loves cake?!" look at all those hands in the air!
caroline is saying "me!!" with her mouth full of cake. :)

i loved watching caroline eat her cake. she enjoyed every little bite!

we worked hard to get this family picture... notice i'm one wrestlin' move short of having ethan in a headlock! and notice the birthday girl still sneaking that icing! atta girl!


caroline shares a birthday week with sweet claire, who just turned one! last year, newborn claire's first outing was to caroline's first birthday party! i think caroline was trying to share the elephant with claire, but she ended up attacking her with it... sorry, claire!


well, the animals are all back in their cages, but it's still a zoo around here! :) we had so much fun celebrating caroline's birthday, and that is just the beginning of celebrations these days! we are looking forward to a wonderful thanksgiving feast with family tomorrow (and friday!) as we reflect on all that we have to be thankful for.

we sure are thankful for our little birthday girl! happy birthday, sweet caroline!