Birthday Weekend!!!!

For the Big O's first birthday, nothing but an entire weekend of celebration would do. So we started off with a special dinner on Thursday, his actual birthday, after picking up Grandpa and Grammy Willard from the airport. Owen shares his special day with Grandpa Bruce, who couldn't be happier.

Then it was time to party!!!!



Here are Owen, Elsa, and Gwen waiting for the celebrations to begin.

Then we put little baby Sanne with them and had one of our famous photo shoots. This time however, we had a professional photographer taking the shots. Our friend Cheryl Mann came to the party and was kind enough to take some great shots throughout the day. Thank you Cheryl for most of the amazing pics in this blog entry. It was so nice to be able to be a part of the day and really enjoy it with Owen instead of worrying about taking pictures. (You can check out Cheryl's website at www.cam-motion.net.)



Mike and I decided that our family tradition when it comes to our children's birthdays will be to buy them one special present and then make a donation in their name. This year Owen's special present was a Tickle Me Elmo, although Mike said it was more for me than him. The donation was to one of our friend's organizations, Camp of Dreams, which you can check out at www.campofdreams.org. Eventually Owen will choose for himself each year where he wants to donate.



Owen received many great gifts; thank you everyone! Here are a few very special ones made with love. The two above, an incredible puzzle and keepsake box, were made by talented Grandpa Bruce. He never stops amazing us with his woodworking, and I know Owen will cherish these for life! The bunny below was made by Great Grammy Helen, who also continues to impress us with everything she makes. Thank you both so much for your hard work!



Here is one of the cute outfits Owen got for his birthday. We had to try this one on right away with his white leather Robeez. Thank you Collin and Cheryl.


Some pics of Elsa enjoying the party.


Gwen looked like she was having a good time too.


Sanne had a little too much fun.







Then it was time for cake, or in this case cupcakes!

We really wanted Owen to get messy for the typical first birthday picture, but he was so concentrated on the sprinkles, eating them one by one. It was actually really cute.


Here is Owen giving the old "shoulder shrug".

This is one of the balloons we had on the fence outside along with a huge silver number one. I stole this idea from Aunt Kika and attempted to put Owen's picture on the balloon. He loved all his balloons, including the enormous singing Elmo, thanks Papa.



Here is Owen winding down with Grammy after a long day of birthday party celebrations and of course the excitement of the March Madness basketball tournament.

As guests left, they could take a magnet of Owen from the fridge. I made them using bottle caps. (Thanks for the tips on how to make them go to Brooke Metcher.)

That's all folks!