Ben's First Birthday

We can hardly believe that Ben had his first birthday on March 20. That is until we look around our house and see all of the new toys and clothes that have accumulated over the past week! Thank you to everyone who showered our little guy with love, attention and gifts for his big day!


Benjamin is quite a lucky little boy since had close to a full week of celebrating the big "1". The birthday festivities started last Monday evening when we took him to Friendly's for dinner and he had his first Conehead sundae (well, Mom and Dad enjoyed the Conehead once Ben had a few tastes :)). We remembered how last March 19, our trip to the gym and my high impact walk on the treadmill had induced labor (and I was certainly glad to be at a restaurant with our son this year instead of being a 9 month gestationally diabetic pregnant lady!!).


Tuesday was his actual birthday and it was a fairly low-key day - presents in the morning, visit Dad at work during the day, meatloaf and mashed potatoes for dinner and then more presents after dinner. Both of Ben's birthday parties were planned for this past weekend so we were able to celebrate his actual b-day quietly as a family.

His new pounding bench kept Ben occupied while I prepared his cereal in the morning.

Opening some of his gifts from Mommy and Daddy. The highlights of the day were his work bench, shopping cart and chunky train set. He was definitely more intrigued with the idea of gifts (and giftwrap) than he was at Christmas.

Checking out his shopping cart...

...and now helping Daddy put it together.

A big birthday smooch from Barney!

We stopped in at CHL to visit Andrew at lunch and the birthday boy was paraded around the office to say hello to everyone.
Later that night Ben opened a few final gifts and absolutely loved....the wrapping paper! He had the most serious face on as he observed it and wrinkled it. Luckily the shopping cart drew his attention away from the giftwrap finally when he discovered that he could put everything inside of it - his toys, our coasters, the remotes, his sippy cup, Barney's toys. When I can't find something from now on, I will know where to look!

We wanted to keep Ben's birthday party small with immediate family and some of his friends that he sees most often and their parents. He doesn't understand the concept of a birthday yet so we didn't want to overwhelm him. To keep the crowd small, we decided to split it up over two days so on Friday morning we had his Gymboree play group party and on Saturday morning we had the family/close friend party.

Ben loves firetrucks so this seemed the only option when choosing his party theme. He will actually make a siren noise when he hears a firetruck pass by our house! Here is some of the decor we used to set the scene:

Invitations I made for Saturday's party.

The tables. Each of the kids got a plastic fire chief hat to wear!

The centerpiece I made, compliments of Highlights magazine. Boy, I never thought I'd open one of those again when my subscription ran out in, oh, 1988!

Goody boxes.
The cake I made for Saturday's party. We also had chocolate cupcakes with red sprinkles for both parties.

Here's the birthday boy trying on the funny glasses that were in the goody boxes. Of course Ben also got a pair!
After his nap on Friday morning, Ben stood in the front windows of the house waiting for his friends to arrive . He was waving and banging on the window when he saw them pull up!! We watched from the window behind the couch at first and then went to the side window to watch them park once we saw someone arrive. On tip-toes Ben can just peer over the windowsill outside.

The Little Fire Chief sat at the head of the table for the party.

Peek-a....

...boo!

Here are all the kids playing before and after lunch.

Ben with his girlfriend Caroline. They really love to caress eachother's collars or hair bows one minute and then push eachother out of the way the next!

Teddy acting silly!Shay and Olivia playing with the fire hats while Kiera tries to teach them to share.
Shay all smiles!

The gang all ready for lunch.

Lunch, yummy! I must have had a temporary brain lapse when I decided to serve lasagna with meatballs and chocolate cupcakes for dessert to six babies!

Mr. Messy sure loved his chocolate cupcake!! It was the first time he had chocolate cake and he really loved playing with the white icing before digging in to his treat.

Here, Olivia has spotted the platter of cupcakes and is asking "Whut dat? Whut dat?" over and over again while pointing!!

Yum, it sure is fun being messy! Olivia...Caroline takes a break from chocolate for a drink.

Julia being not quite as messy as the others (like usual, she is Miss Manners).

After lunch Ben sat in his little Benjamin-sized chair and opened his gifts. What a lucky guy he was to receive such nice gifts! (disclaimer: we really do put socks on our child but he always takes them off immediately, hence the bare feet in many photos!)

After the party, here's Ben playing with his new baseball toy and LOVING it. He was literally hysterical as the ball spun around and around. Guess he takes after his dad when it comes to loving the 'ole ballgame.

Not quite sure what this thing does...

Figuring it out....

...belly laughing!

Saturday morning was Ben's second birthday party with 7 children aged 7 months to 2 years and their parents. Nana and Pop and Uncle Mike and Chang also were there to celebrate Ben's big day.

Here are some of the kids playing. My bowl of "baby trail mix" (aka Goldfish, Gerber puffs and Cheerios) spilled over so everyone had a good time chowing down (with Ben as the ring leader!).

Elaina, Ashley and Ben munching away.

Two pictures of Xander playing hard.
Ben and Elaina playing with the infamous Fisher-Price sorting blocks that every baby I know loves!
Lunchtime. After yesterday's mess with the chocolate cupcakes, I was glad that the cake I made was yellow so the kids were able to have that instead of the chocolate cupcakes.

The Sleepy-head Fire Chief. Ben opted not to take a morning nap yesterday so he was starting to zone out by cake-time.

Samantha patiently waiting for lunch.

Big brother Tyler hamming it up for the camera!

Ashley waiting for lunch.

Singing happy birthday.

Ben enjoying his cake. He's a sweet tooth like his mommy!

"More please!!"
Opening gifts with Mommy. Ben sure is a lucky little guy to have received so many fun toys and nice outfits!

Talya helping out. She'll have her big day in May so Ben may need to repay the favor since it's hard work turning one and having so many presents to open at once!

That second wind from lunch is really starting to fade and Ben's ready for his nap...

Ben with Nana after the party and his nap when it was....time to open more presents! Nana and Pop saved their gifts since he already had so many packages to open at the party.
Here he is on the little Go and Grow Rider he got from them. He already sort of has the hang of scooting around on it but needs to pay attention or else he falls off!