Over the past year our family has added some wonderful new friends to our social circle — people to do life with, to share our time with, to celebrate with. One of those new friends also happens to have a little girl, Sophie, who’s about E.V.’s age. Through Bible studies, gym dates (mostly spent sloooowly walking on the treadmill or in the cafe, haha!) and toddler activities, we’ve been so fortunate to adopt Sophie and her mom, Katy, into our inner circle. What a sweet, FUN, entertaining family they are — and there’s never a dull moment when they’re around! We love them being part of our daily lives, and today we loved celebrating Sophie’s third birthday with them!
Katy and I share a love for party planning, so when she asked me to help her with invitations, I was suuuuper pumped. She chose a petting zoo theme, and with my bleeding-heart love for animals, it was a match made in heaven! Of course, we ended up going a little crazy with the cute creatures we developed for her invitation, carrying the theme over to a super cute photo backdrop (complete with cartoon Sophie!), fabric for a custom romper, and even the gift E.V. gave Sophie (a matching alpaca pillow). In fact, the alpaca quickly became the favorited character, and Katy added little touches of her throughout the party, including the world’s most adorable alpaca washi tape from Japan! Plus, people, you have to see this AMAZING cake Katy had done. My jaw almost dropped. Scroll down. Seriously how perfect is it? In fact, it was so beautiful that when the birthday girl asked if she could eat the pretty cake instead of the sheet cake, we all sighed a bit. I suppose it’s not getting your money’s worth if you don’t actually eat it, right? And when Sophie accidentally dropped her first slice of pretty cake onto the ground, her awesome mom gave in and cut her a piece with a big ol’ pig decoration on it, bringing a big ol’ smile to her little’s face. Worth it!
When the animals arrived, including the must-have alpaca, we were tickled to learn that her name was Elise. How cute is that? Elise the Alpaca was the star of the petting zoo party, but there were lots of other cute, huggable animals, too, including a rabbit, rooster, donkey, cow, sheep, mini horse, pig…and two ponies! Emma Vance was so excited for her first pony ride that when we came home she declared, “Mom, I’m a horse.” Uh, okay, if you say so! Of course, she said this in a sleepy state because we were absolutely exhausted when we returned home: At the party, the girls had run (and crawled) around, played with old and new friends, brushed the alpaca, fed the sheep, hugged the cow, harassed the rooster, rode the pony, ate cake…and left with full, happy hearts. What a wonderful party for a very special little girl!
Happy third birthday, Sophie! We had a blast!!!
