Harrison chose construction as his theme and then, a week before the party, was adamant that his party be fire truck themed. It's completely normal to change your mind as a child. But everything had already been ordered and nothing arrives quickly to a tiny island in the East China Sea. Which is a bit counterintuitive since we are so close to China, where all those sorts of bits and bobs you need for a party are made. We went ahead with the construction theme and took him to a Fire Station on his actual birth DAY.
We kept the costs much lower this birthday, primarily because Harrison's personality was starting to shine through more. He doesn't like loud noises or big groups so we wanted to keep the affair intimate, short, and simple. We had only been in the country for about five months so this was rather easy to do as we didn't have as wide a spread of friends as we did in Hawai'i.
Birthday balloons for the morning of his party.
The spread: we had build your own burgers, logs (pretzels), stop light fruit salad, traffic cone carrots, and a vegetable platter.
The favors: each child received a Home Depot apron, personalized hard hat, stickers, home made playdoh, a carpenter pencil, and granola bar.
The only time we used the wheel barrel while at this house. Haha!
The setup: we had three activity areas: tools, ramps, and sand pit
Hamming it up for the camera, we love you baby boy.
Enjoying the sandpit while everyone else took a break to eat lunch.
Singing Happy Birthday
Blowing out the candles
Eating the cupcakes! They were "build your own" cupcakes and all the kids were able to pick their own toppings.
The food table, it was difficult getting everything to stay in place but duct tape came to our rescue!
Build your own cupcake, the plates are from Target and were so adorable!
Opening presents: we told friends "You don't have to spend a dime, but if you feel so inclined, books are always a wonderful find!" I really like this because we didn't get more toys that we don't need and Harrison still got to open a lot of presents.
I spent about a third of the time I usually do on his birthday and he still had fun! I had fun too because I wasn't so stressed out. Live and learn! We are half way to his fourth birthday and I'm pretty sure he is still going to want a fire truck party, we will see!
