One year old parties are often criticized as being for the parents and not for the kids. And I suppose that could be kind of true to some people, but I do not feel that way. Even though he may not particularly remember it now, my boy deserves to be surrounded by people that love him and get a little bit spoiled at the same time. And plus also, we just happened to go flipping crazy for both girls first birthdays and to not follow suite for Knox just seemed so very wrong. Especially because he may actually read these blogs one day and notice.
But the reality was that we’d just moved and unpacking boxes takes away a lot of party planning time and all the unexpected expenses take away pretty much most of the party. I didn’t want to waste my Shaun the Sheep theme party on something that I couldn’t properly carry out, so we just had a smallish get together at our house for Knox’s 1st birthday party (and house warming and my 27th party) with no theme and random party packs that were just made up of left overs from the girls party.
In a way it was quite refreshing to just have a chilled, no themed get together as opposed to a high stress, lots of pressure, theme infused in every possible way, entertainment and every possible thing though out type of event. Although I really enjoy going a bit bos for their parties, I think these kind of get togethers may be more in our future than I ever thought.
I am so very ashamed to say that we didn’t make the cake (the first time in 4 years), but we morphed the typical Woolies party cake and made it a little more 1 year old boy friendly! A quick how to…. I took off all the toppings usually on the cake. Boiled the kettle and put the boiling hot water into a glass, into which I dipped a knife to smooth out the icing. Making it wet also assisted the packet of sprinkles to stick but I think I should have used 2 bags. It may not be pinterest ready, but I think it turned out OK.
The girls lined up to sing Knox a wonderful rendition of Happy Birthday – no, just joking – all they were interested in was the cake!
We are so grateful to all our friends and family that were able to make it and we missed those who couldn’t be there. And also a very big thank you to everyone for spoiling my boy, me and our new house – we really appreciate all of your gorgeous gifts.
3 Kids, 2 Dogs, 1 Old House 
Looks like a great party to me. We also just had a little party at the house for all the kid’s first Bday. BTW did you see my little competition?
I’m planning to do the same with Hannah’s 1st birthday party! Ava’s 1st birthday was a totally OTT affair but I have learnt so much about kiddies parties since then and realize that as long there is a cake and maatjies, the kids actually don’t care about the details like we do. I’m planning a tea with cakes and cupcakes, our closest family and friends and including Hannah’s dedication into the affair!
Love the cake 🙂 Looks like it was loads of fun!
These are my best kind of parties.. we did it for both kids this year, just our friends, their cousins, at home. Was PERFECT.