We had a great time celebrating Landon's birthday this past weekend. He had to open presents starting the evening before his birthday and ending the evening after because he had so many and he got bored after opening just a couple (plus, he wanted to play with them!) I think this post is best illustrated with the pics from the weekend:
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| Landon posing with one of his many gifts... he learned how to efficiently open presents by the end |
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On Landon's actual birthday, we went downtown to visit the Shedd Aquarium. First, we stopped by the Buckingham fountain.
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| Posing at the aquarium |
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| Landon wore his "Chomp Chomp" shark shirt for the aquarium |
Since we knew Landon couldn't handle hours and hours of the aquarium, we purchased tickets for just the main floor, which ended up working out just fine. Landon petted a sturgeon, marveled at lots of different kinds of fish, and generally had fun. We also got the book "Baby Beluga" which is one of my all-time favorite songs (by Raffi of course). Thanks Grandma Ev! The weirdest thing they had (I thought) was a partially paralyzed sea turtle that had been injured by boats in Florida. Its arms worked great, but its back end kept looking like it was going to float to the surface of the tank! Pretty wild!
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| It was a PERFECT day downtown- sunny, about 80 degrees, and we didn't even have to wait in line at the aquarium because we had a stroller |
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Landon's whale/blue themed party all set up in the common area in front of our house.
Austin did a great job with the decorations- streamers everywhere! |
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| I made a cake that looked kind of like a whale- two types of cake, and two different frostings. |
The whale cake- we wanted Landon to have a smash cake, so I thought the head of the whale would work great for that. The bottom layer was for our party guests. Bottom layer: devil's food cake with a cool whip style frosting. Whale: a homemade vanilla, dense, moist cake with a decorator's icing. It was my first attempt at cake decorating and I think it went well considering all the things that can go wrong with cake!
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| On Pinterest, these jello aquariums looked awesome, and partially see-through so you could see the gummy sea creature swimming on the inside. They ended up being a little dark, but still a fun treat for the kids! |
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| Whale dessert plate detail |
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Other than cake and jello, we had burgers, hot dogs, chips, grapes
and blueberries, corn, and delish sides brought by our friends. |
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I also made the blue punch to the right in this picture. It ended up being more
teal, because I used pineapple juice instead of white cranberry to make it more
tropical tasting, with pineapple sherbet floating in it. |
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| Top of cake detail: It says "Happy 1st, Landon" |
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Austin came home with this whale pool a few weeks before Landon's birthday
after I had explained that we were going to do a whale theme for the party...
It was a big hit. The whale even squirts water out of the top of his head! |
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| The proud parents- just so happens that Austin, Landon and I all wore blu-ish stripes for his birthday! |
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| When we gave Landon his smash cake, he tentatively grabbed some frosting, didn't quite know what to do,then starting gnawing on it as illustrated above. |
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| Frosting up the nose... |
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| And licking the frosting off of dirty fingers... |
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| Opening presents... Landon loved his friend presents, including a tiny basketball just the right size for him to palm, and a drum and other noisemaking devices that he just loves! |
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| Austin's parents came into town to help us celebrate. Here are the 3 generations of Brown boys. |
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| Thanks, Grandma Ev, for all of your help! It was awesome to have you in town to share Landon's birthday with us! |
super fun! The cake definitely looks cute and it sounds yummy too. What a fun partay! Happy Birthday, Landon! I can't believe he's already 1! He's adorable!
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