Colin & Leah's 1st Birthday - The Twins Winter ONEderland!!!!!

Well after months of planning (literally I started jotting down ideas and looking online right after Halloween), Colin and Leah's first birthday was definitely a HUGE success :).  There was lots of eye rolling by my adorable husband at my obsessive compulsiveness over the streamer wall and, well, every other little detail but he did admit today, after their party, that he was glad we did everything we did and that it turned out pretty awesome.

We went with a "Winter ONEderland" theme which was awesome for all the after Christmas sales.  We also made their birthday banner which I decided we were doing after looking on Etsy and then finding a how-to on making them.

We made it with 8 inch letters and the ones on Etsy with 5" letters for this banner were like $50.  I definitely did not spend that making ours and it was fun to pick out the backgrounds for the letters.  Yes, I'm kind of a control freak especially about minor details such as the giant birthday banner ;).

We also had a hot chocolate bar with "melted snow" (white hot chocolate), peppermint chips, mini chocolate chips, marshmallow, and whipped cream garnishes, "snowballs" (cake balls), and "icebergs" (oreo balls).

Oh the infamous streamer wall.  My plan was to make the wall behind the twins' highchairs filled with streamers for the background of their smash cake session.  After 3 hours, 2 rolls of tape, and 10 rolls of streamers, we pretty much had it.  Brad asked me if I was done beating the dead horse at 10:00pm the night before their party as I'm continuing to tape up streamers, but I was pretty darned happy with how it turned out.

Colin & Leah before their smash cake session. This was the only pic of them both smiling with their party hats on! My sister, Bridget, snapped it just in time!

The twins had a blast opening presents although Colin tried to escape the living room altogether a few times :)

 The grand finale....the cake smash session!!!  Their cakes were so beautiful (thank you Merritt's!) and I just loved their little smash cakes.  They of course had such a great time diving in.  Leah actually stuck her face down in the cake at one point and was also trying to sniff it, like up her nose.  Colin somehow made an icing beard on his face and looked like a baby Santa which was too cute.

Such pretty cakes I actually didn't want to cut their big cake hehe :)

The icing beard...

I love my birthday cake!

Definitely have to say a big THANK YOU to Brad of course for putting up with my craziness over having the perfect 1st birthday party for them and staying up late and getting up early with me to finish everything.  Also, to my mom who made the adorable treat bags (all 30 of them), helped decorate, and got up early to do all of the running we had to do the morning of their party.  Thank you to my sister, Bridget, who helped the morning of the party watching the twins, sewed my dress up (how did I not notice that spot that was torn when I tried it on?), ran to get ice for us, took all of the pictures, and was my right hand gal during the party :).  Last, but not least, thanks to my Aunt Peggy who also helped to decorate the house and treat bags, and serve the beautiful birthday cake so we could watch our babies eat their smash cakes.  THANK YOU and LOVE you all SO MUCH!

 HAPPY 1ST BIRTHDAY COLIN & LEAH!!!!  Your dad and I love you so much and agree this has been the best year of our lives!

Christmas

Christmas was a blast this year.  With the twins being old enough to actually kind of open presents and play with toys, it was such a fun time.  We did, unfortunately, have a few...."incidents" of sorts. 

Christmas Eve Eve, Brad was holding Leah on the fireplace and she decided to pull at the stockings and pulled a stocking hanger right on her little noggin.  At first we weren't sure if it hit her or not because of the delayed reaction but the tears came and so did a giant bump.  I was freaking out a little, okay a lot actually, and decided we would all make a trip to the pediatric urgent care.  After we got there, Colin peed out of the leg of his diaper and all over high pj's which they were already in.  Guess what?  Yeah no boy change of clothes.  We had one pair of pink leggings and a pair of purple socks.  So our little guy was in pink leggings, purple socks, and a blue and brown striped fleece jacket.  Let me tell you, he rocked those leggings ;).  Leah was fine and the bump was actually about half its size once we got to the urgent care and she acted as though nothing was wrong.  They basically said she was fine and to just keep an eye on her over the next 48 hours.

Christmas Eve we were at my parents' house and it was getting kind of late and about time to head home.  Just as I was going over to get Colin he fell into a low window sill...and bled and bled and bled.  Okay I was pretty freaked out over Leah's bump but seeing this much blood come out of my little baby boy, I was mega freaking out.  I seriously cannot believe that much blood can come out of one mouth.  Once we saw it was from a one big gash on the inside of his lip and 3 small ones from his teeth, we called the urgent cares which were closed and the ER to find out if they'd stitch it.  Thank goodness for my dad, the voice of reason, during all of this who suggested we call first because he did not believe they would stitch the inside of his mouth.  Well, he was right.  The ER called our pediatrician's husband (they own the practice together) and he said if it was the inside, no stitches, but if it had gone through they would.  So our poor baby has scar tissue and a small bump on his lip :-(.  This is one cautious mama around window sills now.

Christmas itself was great. The twins loved opening presents and Brad and I had a blast watching them. This was actually the first year too that I wasn't really sad the day after Christmas. I absolutely LOVE Christmastime so usually I'm a little bummed when it's all over and kind of wean myself off of the Christmas music but this year I was so excited for the twins' first birthday that I really didn't mind it being over.

Looking at Grandma's Dancing Rudolph and the Island of Misfit Toys

What are these things doing?

My goofy kiddos on Christmas Eve (pre-lip injury)

Christmas Day - We loooove our new Disney sofas!

It's the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse sofa!

Dad with the kiddos