Jenson’s 2nd Birthday Party: Monkey Style
Jenson’s 2nd birthday party was over a month ago, but I thought I should share some of the few pictures I took. It was a good day, but man, are parties stressful to prepare for. Honestly, it wasn’t the party itself…I really think I kept it pretty simple. It’s the fact that I was still refinishing his play kitchen that we did for his birthday up until midnight before the party. I was so frustrated that it wasn’t already done – considering we had the tv stand to convert to a play kitchen for at least 10 months – that I was determined to finish it before the party. It turned out to be a beautiful day for the party – warmer than we were expecting…and Jenson got his nap in before people showed up, so that worked out too. We’ll probably keep the parties even more low-key in the future…it was just a good chance to get friends out to see our new house too. It was his last birthday as an only child, so I wanted to make it a good one while I still had the time and energy to try. Oh well – you learn as you go, right?
We went lite on a theme – just monkey stuff because Jenson had recently become attached to a stuffed monkey that my sister had given him when he was a baby. We hadn’t given it to him because it wasn’t baby-safe (button eyes), so it was packed away until he was out of the chewing-on-things stage. I pulled it out before we flew to Vegas and he took to it right away. Now he sleeps with it every night, and even took it for a few of his 2 year pictures.
When I saw the cake and cupcake ideas on Pinterest, I knew “monkey” was the best and easiest choice. Aside from some cheap decorations, party hats, and the cakes, we didn’t go overboard with monkeys. The cake and cupcakes were super simple to decorate. I don’t have decorating skills, but these were really easy. The monkey face cake was banana cake made with Better Batter gluten-free vanilla cake mix (the best!) with chocolate buttercream frosting and cream cheese buttercream frosting. The monkey face cupcakes were Better Batter gluten-free chocolate cake mix, with the chocolate buttercream frosting, regular and mini vanilla wafers, and upside down white chocolate chips for the eyes. The black decoration was just a small tube of the black decorators gel. The banana chip cupcakes were just the rest of the batter from the other cakes and the cream cheese buttercream frosting – similar to this recipe, but gluten-free – plus dried banana chips. I had our moms throw together the banana and peanut butter roll-ups for the kids while I showered…just banana, peanut butter, and whole wheat tortillas.
The food was pretty simple – pulled pork made the day before in the crockpot, baked beans, mac and cheese (frozen, from GFS), cheesy potatoes, veggies & hummus, chips & dip, chex mix, crackers, pepperoni & cheese, fruit, peanut butter and banana rollups (for kids), and other snacks. And cake and cupcakes, of course. We had a fair amount of the stuff prepped the night before, and Lo swore we’d have time to finish the next day since the party wasn’t until 3 p.m. And then he was sick the next day, and after running out for some last minute things, he was pretty miserable until the party started. Luckily our moms got there early and helped with the rest of the prep. And our dads ran out to buy a #2 candle for the cake because I totally forgot. And then the candle broke when I took it out of the package right before we were getting ready to do the cake…but Lo taped it up with clear tape and you probably couldn’t tell. The hot food was in the kitchen, but I didn’t take any pictures of that.
I’m disappointed that I didn’t get many good pictures, other than of the food before the party started. I was just too busy and it got chaotic when people started arriving and I was still trying to get things finished. Jenson was so distracted with everything that I don’t think I have one of him looking at the camera. My mom took some pics, but I’m not sure that anyone else did. My niece had her phone out the whole time, but it turns out she was just snapchatting and taking pics of herself (mostly) for that…because that’s what teens do now. Last year I assigned her to my camera and she did a great job. I should have assigned someone to take pictures this year.
We still don’t give Jenson a lot of sweets – and man, he loved the cake. In his words “cake is good”. I’m pretty sure he licked his plate.
Jenson got a lot of great gifts – even with us suggesting “no gifts” because he already has so much and we don’t want people to go overboard. He received some money for his savings account, lots of books (which he loves!), toy vehicles, a car race track, and a wooden train, wooden puzzles, play doh and coloring books, and kitchen gear. He was all about opening gifts this year.
And I still need to write the thank-you cards! I think you have 6 weeks, right? (no…I think that’s just for weddings) Luckily, we are close enough to everyone who we invited that they understand that life is a little busy for us right now. They probably wouldn’t even be terribly offended if they didn’t get thank you cards. But they are going to get them, because Jenson and I made them and they are cute. We (Lo and I) just have to write on them and find the envelopes.