Happy Birthday to my baby boy

This post will be bitter sweet. In one way I am so very happy to celebrate Axel's not 1st, but 2nd birthday already! But in another way it means he is no longer my baby boy. This year sure did speed by quickly. It seems like it was last week that we were celebrating his 1st Birthday. But enough about how fast time is going. Let's move on to all things Axel!

It has been a while since I did a post just about him.

Lets list all the things he accomplished this year! (or as many as I can think of while he naps :) )

• Weaned from nursing to the bottle- This was no small feat since up to that point he wouldn't even so much as look at a bottle.
• Added oodles of words to his vocab and is now onto complete sentences.
• Took his first steps, learned how to walk and is now running circles around us on a daily basis
• Slept through the night for the first time and continues to do so with out much complaint
• Took on many house hold responsibilities like feeding the dogs, taking out the garbage, doing the laundry, and helping mom make dinner.
• Learned how to say prayers or rather the beginning, and the end :)
• He became a big brother for the first time, and a very loving and gentle one at that.
• Continues to practice his music skills and pirate imitations on a daily basis.
• Knows all the words to Popcorn popping
• Moved from his crib to his big boy bed with a lot of excitement
• Actually got pee in the potty instead of on the floor or in his diaper
• Moved from demanding for things to saying Please and thank you for what he wants
• Became obsessed with playing sports, then pirates, and now robots.
  
• And much much more
  

We are so proud of you buddy for all you accomplished this year and we can't wait to spend another great year with you watching you learn and grow. We couldn't ask for a better son, you are our favorite little buddy. Thanks for all you have taught us this year and for being so loving and patient with us as we test out parenting on you. We love you to the moon and back!

For his birthday this year we did a Friend Robot Party. It turned out great! I'll be honest here couldn't have done it without the help of Pinterest, oh how I love that site!

Anyway here are the details....

Here is the invite I created in Illustrator

Here is the party set up...If only I had more time I wanted to hang more of the balloons but I was with out a ladder.
The snack table, with the BOBOT center piece I made out of cardboard boxes, tin cans and a couple nuts and bolts. I am all about reusing (I even reused the Axel sign from his first birthday party :)
I opted to use blown up balloons instead of helium this year. I wish I would have had more time to put them in other places, but I think it worked out. The little Robot figuring is from this.
ROBOT GEAR table

Then my sister in law Kassie (knowing and appreciating Axel's deep love for robots) lent me the Robot Party Cartridge she had just created with her work. You should check out her art work on her blog, she is super talented. With out this gem our party would have been quite drab.

I wish I would have started this weeks ago so I could have had more time to make more decorations with it because it really had so much fun stuff on it. But like many things I do, I wait until the last minute and do way too much in that short period of time.

We used the Cartridge to make these hats and goggles for all the guest. And to me it seemed like once I got all the kids hats and goggles fitted on all 20+ guests they were already all done wearing them. But looking through the pictures my sister took, it actually looks like they wore them. SO it was worth ALL the work.

As guests arrived we played a couple rounds of "Ring around the Rosey." I had intended it to be Ring around the Robot, but since I was busy making robot hats for kids my mom stepped in and helped with that part.

We then colored, cut and put together Robot puppets. That was quite challenging. Most of the kids would have rathered just play on Axel's yard toys. (Next time, that's what we'll do) But we did have some kids finish them, and they turned out pretty cute. I am pretty sure Axel was confused the entire time.

We then had a light snack of "Nuts and Bolts", "Motor Oil", and "Computer Chips."

Then we sang Happy Birthday to the birthday boy, who thought that was sooo strange, but something must have sank in because the following day he sang Happy Birthday to himself all day while playing with all his new toys. " Happy happy birthday birthday Axel"He didn't really get the whole how to "blow out the candle thing" and wanted nothing to do with it, or the attention either. (Like father like son :) )

We then cut the Robot cake that I spent SO much time making. It was pretty depressing to cut into. It was my first time making fondant from scratch, and it killed my arms and stomach, I was sooo happy how it turned out. Isn't he CUTE! I kept it a surprise too, Somehow I managed to make it while Axel slept. We then tried our hardest to get him to open his presents but he wasn't a fan of it at all. He loved his presents, but not the part where we told him he had to not play with them. His guests had the same problem with it as well. One of which kept asking, "Where's one for me?"

We sent each party guest home with a little favor bag, filled with "Robot Bits and Pieces" and then recuperated the rest of the evening.

To save space on my blog I didn't want to load all 100+ pictures taken so if you want to see the rest of the photos go visit my Facebook album.

Sunday was his actual birthday, I woke up Axel and sang him Happy Birthday first thing, and he just kept singing it to him self and asking us to sing it to him too. He loved that the song had his name in it. All Sunday morning he spent playing with all his new toys, and was seriously the happiest kid. At church his nursery class sang to him and he loved every minute of it.

That night we had cake and ice cream as a family, and had him blow out candles one more time with the last two pieces of cake from the party.