Holly's First Party

On Sunday we headed over to Aleutia, Mellisa and Cole's house for Cole's first Birthday party. Other then her own party, this was Holly's first party and she had a blast.
We were so excited to see one of our friend's from swim class, Bodie. I met he and his mom Laura for the first time when he was around 12 weeks and Holly was about 14 weeks old. We went to our first swim class together. It ends up that his mom nanny's for Cole twice a week - What a small world.Speaking of a small world, in case I haven't posted the story before, Holly and I met Aleutia and Cole at swim class also, one day when Joel's mom Jackie was visiting. Aleutia came up to us and said she looked familiar, and Jackie said, oh no, I'm not from around here, then Aleutia asked if she was Alan Davis's mom, (Joel's Brother) and she said, YES. It turns out Aleutia was good friends with Joel's best friend from High School, and she knew Joel as well. She was in Alan's grade though, so knew him better.
So now that we have finished with the introductions, lets get back to the party! Here is Cole all ready to eat his Birthday Cupcake. I was able to get two video's during the party. The first one is of everyone singing Happy Birthday to Cole:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f02xreNzlQk

The Second One is Cole making a face plant into his cupcake, and a snippet of Holly playing just at his feet.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BdfzRtsYAi8



Also in attendance was Julia, she is about 11 months old. We met her a few months ago at a picnic with Aleutia and Cole near there house. She is quiet a cutie, very observant and curious.

Cole does this really cool thing where he gets excited and puts his arms up in the air, like a high five and he has everyone trained. As soon as he does it everyone cheers for him and that gets him even more excited.

In this basket there is a set of really cool blocks. They are colored and shaped just like the regular wooden blocks but they are made of these really light weight foam. Holly really likes chewing on them and kept herself entertained doing so while Cole enjoyed his cake.
After cake it was time to open presents. Holly made sure she was in the middle of the action, and what Party Girl wouldn't the paper is of course the funnest part!
Cole got a lot of cute new cloths, some hats and an awesome pair of Vans! How cute is that!

There was a neat set of wooden alphabet blocks, and a lot of fun bath toys, one was a textured book for the bath that was also a puzzle. But my favorite which I think I want to try and find for Holly was a bath city. It was bath blocks that float on a "street" and then you can build the buildings on top. it was pretty cool.
Holly loved playing with this rain stick, they have one at Sadie Dey's Cafe, and it makes very soothing white noise and well the colors are pretty too.
Cole looks pretty awesome in his new hat, and he is having a bit of fun himself with all that stripey paper.
Here is my little Ham posing for a picture, she loves sticking her tongue out and being the center of attention, even when she is not, but of course in her mommy's eye she always is.
I love this stacker. They had one somewhere, in a Doctor's office I think and it is a lot of fun. There are the donut shamed blocks and then a set of octagon ones and finally there are the square ones, they fit together like opposite steps.
Once all of the presents were done, Holly jumped right in to play with Cole and his new toys. Well play is the operative word, perhaps she was trying to steal away his new toys.
Eventually they both lost interest and Holly headed over the the maraca's. These are a leap frog toy and when you shake them they sing in both English or Spanish, I think it does numbers and letters.
It was cool that Cole got these as they totally match the Leap Frog guitar that we got for him. Holly picked it out. When you strum it is sings and does Colors and Animals I think. It has a page that you can turn and switches from one thing to another.
Here is Cole doing his little arm pump, I think he really liked all of his loot!
After playing with all of his new toys Cole went down for a nap and Holly had free rain for a bit. She made the round checking out all the new stuff and entertaining the grown ups.
This was a cool motorcycle, that my little rock star went hot rodding on. Her tippy toes couldn't quite touch the ground so she had daddy help her zoom around town.
Here my little show off is standing. I had to get a photo of her cute outfit! It of course was themed to match her gift. I love the little leggings.
This is an awesome toy that I hear came from Cole's Grandparent's in Florida. When he was visiting over Christmas he got it. His mom's put it together, and then realized they had to somehow get it home. I totally could sympathize with getting home Holly's toys from Christmas.. in Fact Oma had to ship them to me.
But this was also a neat toy that I tried to get off of Craigslist a few weeks back, it was the one that Chloe's mom beat me too. Now Holly has two friends with it, so she doesn't need it, plus it is a lot bigger in person then I imagined. She did enjoy putting the balls in and watching them twist down the spiral and shaking the built in rattles.
After her long day she began to wind down and was ready for a nap. Just in time Cole woke up and came to play for a bit before we headed out. After leaving we drove around Alameda for a little while heading down to the coast and driving along the beach, giving Holly a chance to fall asleep in the car. Then we got some crazy bread and pizza and headed home. All in all we had a great day.