A Birthday Story, or, How We Celebrated Jones First Birthday and One Whole Year as a Family of Three!

First Birthday Madness!  We had Jones' first birthday party on Saturday, April 7, 2012.  We had a cookout and invited all of our close friends and family.  The weather was perfect, the food was excellent, and the house and yard were in tip-top condition (thanks to Alan and I toiling like Hebrews for the week prior to the party).  The birthday boy, however, woke up with a fever and was just not feeling that hot during the party.  He was so sweet, though, quite the trooper.  You could tell he knew he was supposed to be having a good time, and that he wanted to be enjoying himself, and he gave a good effort, but he definitely was not well, and actually continued to run the fever on Sunday so he missed out on Easter as well.

So, he didn't feel that well, but he looked precious, of course.  I had his little birthday shirt made by somebody on Etsy, and I love it.  And, of course, I love his Toms, even though they didn't last very long (Jones loves to be barefoot).  Alan always teases me that I dress the Jones the way I would like to dress Alan (and, Alan, just FYI - after all of these years, I've pretty much got you trained to dress the way that I want you to, and you look good :o)), so of course he had to tease me about Jones' outfit for the day (while simultaneously telling me (and Jones) that he looked great) since I prep-i-fied him with the cute plaid button down with the sleeves rolled up, topped by the birthday shirt, khaki shorts, and Toms.  Whatever:  precious, all the way!  Grammy (my grandmother, Jones' great-grandmother) bought him a birthday boy button to wear, and it was too cute. 

Here is the invitation:

I was happy with the way it turned out except that (as you can probably tell), the writing on the bottom part was very tiny and very light.  But nobody showed up on the wrong day or at the wrong time, so I guess it was legible enough.  A lot of people told me it was really cute and that they were stealing the idea for their child's next birthday party, so I take that as a compliment :o).


The cake table

We had cupcakes, cookies, and that is Jones' cake in the center.  Alan was appalled by the size of the smash cake (I had ordered it from the bakery and he went ot pick it up on the day without knowing a thing about what he was picking up).  He was like, "This is the cake that he's going to tear into?! It's huge!  Babies can't have that much cake or sugar!"  I told him to chill out, that my vision of the smash cake was something tiered and kind of outlandish (Alan:  "That's not what most people do!  Most people have small cakes or cupcakes for them!"  Me:  "Well, I'm not most people."  Alan:  "You got that right."), so that's what I got.  He was still appalled, but he didn't say anything else.  He was a big fan of the cookies, which I thought turned out really cute - they had Jones' monogram on them (y'all know how I love a monogram).  We also had hamburgers, chicken wings, chips, dip, veggies and dip, but I, being bad at taking pictures, did not get a picture of the other food table or our main course.  Suffice it to say that the table was just a bigger version of the dessert table, and looked good, and everything was delicious.

There were lots of presents to open!  Jones was not feeling well, which is why he is sitting so placidly in my lap during most of these, and why I had to help open them more than I thought I would.  Based on his performance at Christmas, I figured he woudl tear up the birthday gifts, but the poor baby was just not feeling well, so I did most of the work and he was content to just kidn of wave the pieces of paper/ribbon/tissue paper around once I got them started.  We also had help in the form of Mattie May (Jones' cousin/my niece - she's the cutie in orange), Reynolds (in pink, grabbing for the ribbons excitedly), and Molly Mac (in blue, trying to decide whether she sould rather help open presents or play with the musical table).

I think he was totally freaked out by the whole cake experience.  I think it was because everybody was looking at him - all of that attention focused on him weirded him out.  Combined with the fact that he didn't feel well, I'm just glad that he didn't start crying or throwing a fit.



Look at his face!  He is totally weirded out:  "You want me to do what?"

He didn't really do anything to the cake except poke at it, so I took it away and gave him a cupcake.  He did better with that:

All worn out after the festivities, he was ready for a nap and some snuggle time (and some Tylenol).

Jones is such the ladies man (say it in the SNL voice:  "ladieth man").  His boy buddies, Jett and Charlie and Grant, were all unable to make it due to the holiday (and Charlie was also ill and running a fever, so apparently there was something going around on that particular weekend). This is Jones and Molly Mac:



"So, Molly ... you thinkin' Prom 2028? 
Think maybe your grandpa will loan us one of his cool cars so we can go in style?"

And this is Jones and Reynolds and Molly Mac:

For my own memory's sake, I'm putting it in writing all of the people that attended, so I can remember years from now:  Grammy and Papa, Nana and PePaw, Grandma and Grandad, Uncle Patrick and Aunt Sarah, Mattie May, T (Sydney, my aunt and Jones' great aunt, who got him one of his favorite presents - the Fisher Price Elephant), The Stracks (Jonathan, Jessica, and little Jackson, Jones' future roomie/bestie who, at 5 months old, slept through the festivities but was still supercute in his seersucker pants), Uncle BA and Aunt Steph (who also deserve a shout-out for all of their help in pulling everything together on the day of the party - you guys are awesome, we love y'all!), Cody and Leslie, The Hogan Family (Jessie, Aaron, and Carter - I didn't get any pictures of sweet Carter - Jessie had coached him on saying "Happy Birthday Jones!" but he got shy when he got to our house so I never heard it - he and Cy had a big time feeding the spoiled labradors potato chips outside), Jackie Davis and Cy Davis (he was a riot - a glimpse into the future, that's what he and Carter were for me), Emily Mac, Molly Mac (Jonathan Mac gets a shout out for sending a sweet birthday message to Jones via text since he couldn't attend the party because, as he stated in said message, he "had to sell some furniture" :o)), and the Sprotts, and The Whitts (Brandon, Julie, and Reynolds).

One Year as a Family of Three!