A Brown Bear Birthday Party!

I started mentally preparing for Gerrit’s first birthday party when he was about 6 months old. I think I was just so thrilled that we had survived the first half of his first year that I figured the second half of the year would be a breeze. Or something like that, haha. One of the first books that Gerrit showed interest in was Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? 

It continued to be a favorite as he approached his first birthday, so it was an easy choice for a birthday party theme. Thank goodness for Pinterest! I found a lot of cute ideas on there to use. Unfortunately, I didn’t get to use them all, because 1) I got sick just a few days before the party, and 2) I’m a procrastinator who couldn’t pull it all together because of the stupid cold bug that I caught. I’m not bitter about it at all. 😛

I’m so glad that my sister Becki was able to come to take photos of the weekend’s events. She’s done beautiful photos of my other nephews and niece, but we hadn’t been able to take advantage of her talents since Gerrit had been born. I was excited to put her to work!

I loved how the backdrop for Gerrit’s cake smash came together! I had seen the idea on Pinterest using 3 cheap plastic tablecloths, but I figured it would be even better with 6 of them. My mom and Andrew’s mom put it all together, and I couldn’t have been happier with the result. It’s so bright, colorful, and festive! My Cricut made the banner come together quickly to go above Gerrit’s high chair.

The “My First Year” mantel was one of my favorite decorations for the party. I collected various 5×7 photo frames, painted them to go with the colors in the book, and got prints of Gerrit’s monthly photos. I also scoured Amazon for animals in the appropriate colors (blue horse was a tough one…). My sister found a few other animals that she sent to me so I had extras to add to the snack table:

My mother-in-law did such a nice job arranging all the fruits and veggies in a rainbow for the snack table! There were strawberries, raspberries, and red pepper strips (red bird), mandarin oranges (gold fish), pineapple slices and yellow pepper strips (yellow duck), green grapes (green frog), blueberries (blue horse), purple grapes (purple cat), and blackberries (black sheep). We also had mozzarella cheese (for white dog), Teddy Grahams (for brown bear, of course), and Goldfish crackers (for gold fish). All kid-friendly foods that I hoped would be just as yummy for the adults.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We also had a “healthy” birthday cake for Gerrit which made enough batter for a half dozen cupcakes for the kids at the party. I think everyone enjoyed the cake, and I was happy that Gerrit wasn’t getting loaded up on butter and sugar.

 

I originally looked into some activities for 1-year-olds to do at the party, but in the end I just pulled out some of Gerrit’s favorite books and toys and put them on the shelves of the gift table. I’m so glad I decided to do that: so much less for me to do, and all the kids (from 6 months to 6 years) enjoyed the toys and books. I was pleasantly surprised!

Gerrit would have been happy with one gift, haha! He was a little annoyed with me making him put down each new toy to open a new one. Luckily, the older kids were happy to help him unwrap his presents.

Gerrit loved all the kids, and he’s at the age where he really doesn’t care if anyone opens his gifts for him, so I was happy to let the other kids help him out. Plus it made the process go a little faster. One-year-olds do not have a long attention span! And then we got to move on to the cake smash:

Surprisingly, Gerrit did not get upset when everyone sang “Happy Birthday” to him! He was a little uncertain about it, but he didn’t start crying (yay!). I had been singing the song to him for a few weeks beforehand, hoping it would prep him a little. I have no idea if it worked or not, but I’m glad there were no tears.

I think Gerrit had a great time at his first birthday party! He enjoyed munching on different snacks (we found out he really likes Goldfish crackers), he loved watching and playing around the other kids, and I’m pretty sure the cake made him pretty happy!

A huge thank you to my sister for the beautiful photos — you rock! I’m also so thankful to our parents for helping us prepare and pull it all together when Andrew & I were feeling so under the weather. And we really appreciate the friends who came out and spoiled our little boy with fun presents (and presence!). It was such a fun afternoon, and we had a very happy little boy!