Birthday party for a 2 year old boy

This past weekend we had a little birthday bash for young Jack.  I thought it would be a little house party but I may have gotten pretty excited about the occasion and somehow ended up with 40 adults and 20 toddlers.

Most parents seems to pick a theme for their toddlers but most of those kids are in love with princesses or Mickey Mouse or Thomas the Train or Diego and Dora or dinosaurs.  Jack isn't really obsessed with any character.  He likes Elmo well enough but his true love is the alphabet.  Letters.  A to Z.  So I decided to try to incorporate some letters.

I made these little flags and mason jars as decoration.

 

 

And of course I had to finally use all those pictures I took every month of Jack. Two years of photos really look pretty neat all strung together.

 

 

And then for favors I decided to write the kids' names on these sand pails and fill them with bubbles and a whiffle ball. Turned out pretty cute I think.

  

Of course, what really made the party was the bouncy house. It's amazing how much kids love those damn bouncy houses. But it was money well spent.

 

 

Jack woke at 5:45am and then jumped for about an hour by himself before the party started. Then another hour of party craziness and jumping so he was exhausted by 11:30 and needed some peace and quiet. Luckily daddy was there to read him a book in our empty bedroom.

  

Once he settled down and we realized we had a short window available, it was cake time! Everyone sang happy birthday and Jack took it all in stride.

 

 

He was just waiting to get his hands on some cake. He had been talking about cake and cupcakes all week. The kid has a serious sweet tooth.

 

About 20 minutes after cake time and while all of his guests were still present, Jack decided it was nap time.  In the middle of the party, right there on daddy's shoulder.  

 

All in all, I think it was quite a successful party.  Everyone seemed to have fun and there were no major temper tantrums or meltdowns.  Here are the rest of the random pictures from the party.  Happy 2nd birthday Jack!!

Aunt Julie and Jack taking a break on the counter

cousin Johnny in the bouncy house

Violet enjoys some sweets too

Cousin Hank loves balloons

Uncle John and Hank

Hydrating after a long day of jumping

Daddy and Jack running through the balloons

Aunt Julie with her nephew

Jack and his best buddy Nicholas

Kevin and little Violet

cousin Christy, Aunt Leslie, and the birthday boy

Violet can't believe how high Jack can jump

our family with our big two year old boy