Happy First Birthday! Plus a Look at Our Celebration!

Yesterday was the big day and I really can't believe it's over already. We woke the girls up just in time to celebrate the exact minutes that they were born. We started a new family tradition of birthday banana chocolate chip pancakes for breakfast. Nova, Kurt, Aunt Kate and cousin Jillian came over for pizza and ice cream cake. Despite their lack of naps and nursing like newborns again the girls had a great day! They were up until 10:30 last night thanks to more sugar than they've had in their entire lives (we won't make that mistake again) but I was grateful for the extended time with them. It's hard to believe they're one!

Too much sugar, not enough hours in the day. Happy Birthday Baby Girls!

We also had a fantastic day celebrating last Saturday! All of their favorite people came, we had lots of good fun, fun and laughter and of course cake and presents! The girls did great, only crying when we tried to get them to eat their smash cakes and when they got a little overwhelmed towards the end. I was holding back tears most of the day and tried to keep busy so I wouldn't have a breakdown over them turning one. I still can't believe it.

It was hot out but the yard was well shaded and our only big issue was the bugs that wouldn't stay away from our food!

Our theme ended up being just the colors from their invitation that my awesome sister created for us. We took the colors and ran with the rainbowish theme and it ended up being perfect!

I wasn't going to do special first birthday outfits but we were at Buy Buy Baby last week picking up some things for our new friend Dominick and I spotted the perfect little tutu sets that matched our "theme" perfectly!

I chose a few special things to try and put together rather than a lot of little things to go with the theme and I'm happy with how everything turned out. My sister created pennant flags in the theme colors and we created banners for their high chairs. I wanted to do one of those chalkboard stats but after working on it for a bit my sister and I decided to do a white poster instead and hang it on the house above the gift table. It came out beautifully and everyone loved reading all about the girls. I also created collages from their monthly pictures with their names and birth stats. It's crazy seeing their transformation over the last year - from 4 pound peanuts to almost 18 pound toddlers! I also wrote a little poem for the guest book to make sure people left them a little note (people still forgot to do it though, grrrr...)!

We ordered our cake from the local grocery store and they did great matching our invites perfectly. They created adorable cupcake smash cakes that are super yummy even though the girls were totally freaked out by them! They ate plenty of good food (broccoli, cauliflower, asparagus, melon, kiwi, cheese, crackers) first but then wouldn't touch the smash cakes and when we tried to offer them some frosting they both lost it! We're going to try again on their real birthday this Thursday and hopefully it will go over better without a crowd!



I'm happy to say people really followed our wishes to limit they types of things they gifted us and we were so lucky to receive great presents that the girls will use for a long time! Lots of fun books, cute clothes and pajamas, wooden and manipulative toys and blocks, a climber from Papa T, a water table from Aunt Lisa, a tent from Aunt Jude and a great red wagon from Grandpa Charlie! They received their first earrings (ruby!) from GG and Jama and their starter pearls from Nova. Their Auntie Debz worked so hard updating her and Jama's childhood rocking chairs into beautiful keepsakes for them.


We set up their pool and filled it with balls and toys for them to enjoy when they weren't being passed around and held by everyone. Cousin Jillian had fun running around, blowing bubbles and playing in their tent too. She loved showing off her special shirt which served as the announcement that she is going to be a big sister!! So excited for my sister, Kate and her boyfriend Justin! I can't wait to be an Auntie again!
 

All in all it was an absolutely wonderful day, full of memories and good times. The only thing I managed to forget was music! I had put together a special playlist full of some of our favorite songs and all of my parenting love songs to play over with our speakstick but completely forgot about it until the very end. Oh well, we'll just listen to it all week this week! Thank you to everyone who came out to celebrate and who helped me put it all together, our girls are so lucky to have such amazing and loving family and friends!

The first year was a wild ride and I learned so much about myself - most importantly that I am stronger than I ever could have imagined. They're not kidding when they say the first few months of twins lives' you are basically in survival mode - we definitely were, but we made it! I'm working on a post about the things that helped us make it through to help other twin parents. Every day brought new challenges and new rewards and it's hard to believe we're only just getting started!  Love you so so so much my little leos!

Xo,

Maigen