Hannah's birthday...

I haven't posted about this yet, mostly because I didn't have all the pictures offloaded. I LOVE my new Canon and have been shooting like crazy, but the picture files are much larger and it takes me longer to process them (size them down and save them for email/publishing)...and I tend to procrastinate.

Anyway - Hannah had her 7th birthday party on Sunday (my goodness...SEVEN already! Where did the time GO?????), and her theme this year was NOT Tinkerbell (though she wavered on that for a bit!). She chose "Bindi The Jungle Girl" for her theme. I ordered the deluxe kit from Birthday Express. It came with 8 of the following: goodie boxes (shaped like thatched huts, and filled with stickers, a mini (think beanie baby) monkey, an animal finger puppet, an alligator water squirter, binoculars and a whistle...a LOT of stuff!), plates, forks, spoons, placemats,...then it had napkins, candles, confetti, streamer ribbons, ballons, (including a mylar, of course) and a large green tablecloth.


Hannah and Bindi, in balloon form....

It was fun. She invited 4 girls from school (3 from her class and one from last year's class), and her friends Ashlyn and Alyssa (we've known them now since 2005 and were in Germany with them!). Along with Scotty and Hannah, that made 8 kids in the house...but they were SO well-behaved!


The crew, just before the musical squares. We asked everyone to dress in their jungle attire! Khakis and white shirts seemed to win out!
Some of the best moments were decorating frames. I spent $1 per frame at Target in the $1 spot...each frame came with stickers, gems and glitter glue. I got a few extra tubes of glitter glue, some paper flowers and a pen to mark their names. This kept them busy for QUITE a while...they ALL loved it, including Scotty!


Scotty shows off his decorated frame, and Hannah adds finishing touches.


After this, we went downstairs for a few quick games of Musical Squares...not chairs (no room). We use the squares from the Candyland DVD game. That was a blast.
the kids try to find an unoccupied square...and Sidney is victorious, while Katy is a gracious 2nd placer.

Then cake and ice cream.


jungle cake - note the waterfall....fun and easy cake this year!

The cake was REALLY fun and easy to do this year. I had originally thought that a cake topper came with all the birthday-themed stuff I got...but I was wrong. I thought about how I could make a jungle-style cake, and that was the result. A chocolate cake...then I used white icing (homemade buttercream, nothing less!) to ice the "pond" white, otherwise the "water" would not show! Then I used prepackaged "piping gel", tinted it that wonderful blue color (I used too much tint, lol) and put that over the white. Before I added the gel, though, I made the "grass". That was just the #234 "multi-opening tip" (from Wilton) I just kept adding it. I didn't use white icing underneath, since I figured the chocolate could be the "dirt" in the jungle. Topped with three vinyl animals from Walmart (only 88 cents EACH, and toys for the kids after!), piped with words (and for the record, I didn't use any lettering templates this time...that's REALLY my handwriting!)

The placemats I got had puzzles and things on the back and that entertained the kids for longer than expected. We actually had to beg them to stop so Hannah could open her gifts!

She really enjoyed all the gifts she got from her friends. I do think though, that her favorite was the Webkinz Pink Poodle....



We had our neighbors over for cupcakes on her REAL birthday (the 15th!)...and then she got to open all the goodies from family. She TRULY loved everything...from the warm blanket and pillow (Tinkerbell!) from Grandma, to the Nintendo case and game from Auntie Sue and Auntie Donna....she got lots of "activity" things like color explosion "stained glass" from Aunt Alice Kay (with a WAY cool top to wear!), a Tinkerbell "white" color explosion, Tinkerbell paintset...well, suffice it to say she has NO reason to say she's bored anymore!

I can't believe this little girl's already turned 7...seems like just yesterday she was kicking her way out of my c-section (she's got the scar to prove it!)