Happy Birthday Isaac!

I considered calling this post “We kept a human being alive for a year!!!” but it just didn’t have the right feeling behind it. So I stuck with the classic Happy Birthday line. Forgive me for not being too witty at the end of a long weekend.

By the end of the party we’d had about 30 people come and go, taken about 200 pictures, filmed 5 minutes of video (100% of it being Isaac eating his cake), gone through 200 chicken nuggets, plenty of water, chocolate milk, soda and beer and had some dang good cake and cupcakes. Through it all our house was, surprisingly, in very good shape. Sure there were some dishes to be washed, but on the whole it was a pretty clean party. The joys of doing most everything outside.

Isaac semi-cooperated in the morning, waking up around 8. Everyone got up and started doing our tasks. I finished up the yard work Honey had been nice enough to start the night before, finished all the setup outside, took a shower, shaved and got Isaac down for his nap. After I got him down I bolted to get the Chick-Fil-A nugget tray I’d pre-ordered. When I got there they hadn’t started the order, totally saw that coming, so I had to wait around for 10 minutes before I got the tray (AND MY SPICY CHICKEN BISCUIT!!!) and took off. On the way home I got to swing by the store and pick up some Blue Bell for dessert (who wants cake without ice cream? communists, that’s who) and got some bags of ice.

Let me detour for a second here.

I bought four bags of ice at Kroger, thinking that would be MORE than enough. After all, 80 pounds of ice is a lot of ice. I went in knowing it was going to be more expensive than making it at home, but making 80 pounds of ice is ridiculous. So I paid the $1.84 per bag (they’re 99 cents at Buccees, that’s all I’m saying) and went to pick up my bags. Then I noticed they were TEN POUND BAGS?!? I never heard of ice being sold in 10 pound bags. Everywhere I’ve looked (granted it’s mostly at truck stops and gas stations but still, everywhere) they’ve been 20 pound bags. Are 10 pound bags common? And if so, why?

And now back to our regularly scheduled blog post…

By the time I returned home it was about 10 minutes before party time. My parents had gotten there and my mom was hanging the Happy Birthday Isaac from the garage door. Robyn’s good friend Emily (also our friend, but through Robyn so she gets the credit) was nice enough to have made the fancy birthday letter stuff you’re about to see.

I dropped off the food and went inside and saw the adorable cake that had been dropped off while I was gone. Remember, it’s a rubber duck themed party.

This cake rocked. It’s a bathtub on a tile floor with a towel, a bar of soap (they even etched Dial onto the soap), and the faucet with handles. I’ll have to get Erin’s friend’s information for anyone who needs a cake made for an event because it was sweet. And I hear it tasted good too (Erin got chocolate cake, which she knows I don’t eat. She justified it by saying I could eat what you’re about to see).

Erin and her mom made two dozen of these bad boys for the party, making the cupcake and then icing them, plopping a donut hole on top, a diagonally cut marshmallow for the butt, two brown mini M&Ms and an orange Starburst for the beak (or butt in the case of the ones in the back). My favorite part of making the cupcakes? Easy, Erin got two bags of Starburst and we had to eat all except the orange ones so they could make them.

So we had everything ready for the party, and what happened? In the midst of one of the worst droughts in Texas history…it rained.

Fortunately we’d planned on doing water toys in the yard for entertainment, and rain (without lightning) couldn’t put a damper on that. It wasn’t pouring, just a nice drizzle for a good chunk of the party. And, about 30 minutes into the party, the nephews busted out the swimsuits, broke the seal and good times in the yard were had!

After some good times out in the water by Isaac, Barrett, Hunter, Mason and Samantha, we decided it was time to give Isaac his first taste of cake. Erin has been willing to give Isaac pretty much every food known to man but didn’t want him to have cake until his birthday so he would go nuts and tear his smash cake apart.

Yes, I'm holding his hands to make sure he doesn't grab the lit candle.

Well, she was somewhat disappointed.

Testing the Cake Water

He wasn't sure, so I helped

And then he started getting into it

This Cake? A Thumbs Up for This Cake!

After the cake affair we threw Isaac in the tub to get all the remnants off before he opened his presents.

Present opening started off as a Mom and Isaac affair, but (no surprise here), by the end had expanded a bit.

Let Me Help with Your Presents

It was nice to have the party at our house. Sure the whole prep thing was a little crazy, but it was relatively cheap, comfortable and just a great place to have friends and family over to celebrate such a wondrous occasion.

To finish it off, here’s a picture of Isaac from his actual first birthday. He was, literally, exactly one year old when we took this picture (as best the clocks in our house told us at least).

I'm This Old!