Happy Birthday, IAN!!!

I am a little late in posting this......

My handsome little guy turned 4 this year!!  I can't believe how big he has gotten.  It seems like yesterday we were bringing him home from the hospital.  He is definitely a momma's boy and a big sweetheart.  He always comes up to me and gives me a hug and kiss and says "I like you!"  He is definitely all boy too!!  He won't wear any clothes that have "girl" colors and if you call him cute....watch out!!  He gets so mad!  He says he is not cute, he is cool! =)  He loves to box, wrestle, pretend he's "IronThor" (he wears his iron man costume with a cape) and run around crazy!  But he still loves to sit and cuddle me when he gets the chance. His favorite things are Avengers right now.  You can convince him to do anything if you can connect it to one of them....except Black Widow because she's a girl.  I am so grateful to have this little man as my son.  I love him more than I could ever hope to express.  He is a true blessing in our lives.  I know he is one of our Father in Heavens strong spritual warriors and I can't wait to see him grow into that.  I don't always have the patience I should with him....especially when he is supposed to be taking a nap but is instead playing with robots....but I am eternally grateful he is my little stinker.  He is such a special little guy and is so full of life (aka mischief!). I wouldn't change a thing about him!! I love you, IAN!!!

His new favorite things are silly monsters.  We redecorated his room with them and he wanted to have his birthday party with monsters.  Now, when you go to the party store, there aren't exactly very many silly monster decorations so I had to make my own.  Thankfully I already had some ideas and then was able to get a few from Pinterest.  This party was alot of fun to put together because there were lots of colors and pretty much anything goes with monsters =)

Before decorating for the party I had to figure out the cake.  So I just browsed the internet for some ideas.  I usually make the cake and frosting from scratch but I was lazy this year and used box cake mixes and canned frosting.  Taking care of a newborn that sleeps all day actually takes more time then I remembered....but then again having 2 other kids adds to it =)

Here is my cake.  I wanted to do it green since that is my little guy's favorite color.  After I decorated it I realized it looked like mike Wysowski from Monsters, Inc.  That was totally unintentional!!!

I then wanted to do cupcakes for all the kids (I wanted to save the cake for our family birthday party that night)  So of course the cupcakes had to have monsters.  I am not the most artistic but I think you get the idea of it. 

Here's how I did the eyes in case you are wondering:  I just melted some white chocolate and squirted it into circles on wax paper and put M&M's for the eyeball. 

I saw a cute idea here for some party favors.  I loved having something the kids could take. I had lots of fleece and felt scraps so I just cut them in various shapes and faces.  it was a pain to hand sew them together since for some reason my sewing machine wasn't wanting to sew....it kept knotting up.

I also made these cute little monsters for decoration and then my monster got to keep them to play with after the party.

I can't take credit for this fun centerpiece.  My sister made it.  She got some plastic plant holders and painted them, and then a plastic dish for the top.  She then decorated it like a monster.  She filled the plastic dish with gummy worms (my little boy's favorite treat and perfect monster food =)  )

These decorated the goodie bag table.  I made these awhile ago as decorations in his room.

I scored with these!  I went to the Dollar Tree and found them.  They were perfect for the party!!  I wanted a game that 4-year old kids could do.  this bingo game was great for them.  And the green and blue bubble containers in the background were also from the Dollar Tree.  They made the perfect prizes for the games.

Here is another game I did.  It was "Pin the Eye on the Monster"  I had to draw the poster but you could probably use a Monsters, Inc poster if you can find one. (the little guy in the white shirt with the monster on it is my little monster =)

Another game I did, but I forgot to get pictures before, was I put pieces of paper in balloons with prizes on it and told the kids to pop them for their prize. Because we all know that as soon as a kid sees a balloon the first thing in their mind is "Can I pop it?"  And this saves me from dealing with all the balloons after.  The catch was, I had some balloons with a monster face (you can see the blue and yellow one in the picture above).  The kids had to find a monster balloon to pop.  This was a hit with the kids.  Just make sure you have something on hand to help pop balloons with for those who aren't heavy enough to pop it by jumping on them =)

Before the Party started, to keep the kids distracted while guests were still arriving, I printed off a bunch of monster pictures and let them color them.  

I then decked out the room with streamers in all sorts of colors: red, yellow, blue, and green.  I also used all the extra balloons as decorations.  This was a very colorful party.  All of the kids had lots of fun and I think some of the parents that stayed had a good time too =)

Here are a few party pics:

Ian loved playing Monster Bingo.  

He patiently waited for each monster to be called and got excited when he had it on his card.

When he opened his presents he gave each person a hug to say thank you.  What a sweetie!

He got to blow out his candles...shush...don't tell anyone I lit candles in the church.

He loved his silly monster cake.  He is such a terd when it comes to pictures.  He will smile and then move his eyes away from the camera.  

Happy Birthday buddy!!!