Butterfly 1st birthday party

On Saturday, 30th April at 2:30pm, we celebrated Lily's 1st birthday party.  It was a really special day spent with family and friends and everyone seemed to have a wonderful time.  We were also blessed with superb weather, especially for this time of year and thankfully for this OCD mom, most of the babies spent their time walking and crawling outside instead of inside the house!

I braved myself for a chaotic day as we invited 18 of Lily's little friends.  Obviously it isn't only babies who attend 1st birthday parties so we catered for 18 x 3 (for the parents as well).  So our house was very festive indeed!  The only downside to having so many invites was that I felt rather guilty not being able to speak to everyone there, but I'm sure they understand having gone through the same feeling when their little ones celebrated their big day.

So Lily's theme was butterflies - very girly and very pink!  Lily was dressed in pink to match the theme as well as wearing little butterfly wings which she wasn't too fond of so they didn't last too long.  She looked too adorable even if I say so myself.  Here's a picture of her with her daddy before the guests started arriving:

We set up tables and chairs for all the babies along with butterfly themed cups, plates, party packs and blowouts.  The poor little boys just had to deal with all the girlishness!  I am still amazed at how these little people manage to sit so nicely at their little seats and gobble down what's on their plates (as well as throw carefully selected contents onto the floor).

Lily's cake and cupcakes turned out magnificently - I was so pleased.  I ordered 50 cupcakes as well as a large butterfly cake which everyone seemed to thoroughly enjoy, but as usual, I over catered so now we have a freezer full of cake!  Oh well, I don't have to worry for the next few tea parties I host - we will all just be eating leftover cupcakes.

Everyone started leaving after 5pm which was a good indicator of how well everyone enjoyed themselves as the party was supposed to end at 4:30pm.  My mom did an excellent job helping with the cleaning up, as did Lulu who had come in for the day to help us along.  After all was tidied up, Lily opened up a few presents, but was so very tired, that we decided to leave the opening of presents to mom and dad a little later.  Lily had a quick bath and then, to my utter astonishment, she fell asleep while I was putting her pyjamas on!  She has never just fallen asleep like that!  She was truly and utterly exhausted from her big day!  Bless, it was really so very special.

Lily was very spoilt and received so many lovely gifts ranging from beautiful clothes, building blocks and puzzles to beauty sets, hair accessories and books.  I have put some of them away for a later stage so she can enjoy each and every one of her presents individually.

So all-in-all Lily had a wonderful, special and amazing birthday celebration.  I am so very proud of our little angel, she is truly the light of our lives and I look forward to throwing her many, many more happy birthdays in future.

Some more pictures of her special day: