Carrie & Crew: Isabella's "Friend" Party

Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Isabella's "Friend" Party

This is the first year that we have had a separate party for Ella's friends. Since our family includes so many little cousins, our family parties have always been full of kid energy. But, the time had come to include Ella's many school friends in our birthday celebration as well.

Since I knew I would either be really PG or have a new baby, we decided to have her party at our local Gymnastics Gym. Isabella attends gymnastics and loves it, so it was a natural fit. Plus, the staff at the gym takes care of everything from invitations to cake, so it was an easy party for us to plan! My pictures didn't turn out the best as it was a little dark in the gym, but hopefully you will get the idea of what the kids did. There were many kindergarten friends at the party, big and little cousins and church friends. All in all, we had a group of about twenty kids and they all had a blast. After an hour of jumping into the foam pit, doing an obstacle course, and playing with a parachute, the kids were wore out. They sang happy birthday and relaxed while watching a delighted Ella open her presents. The party ended with cake, ice-cream, balloons, treat bags, and lots of smiles. Best of all, Mark and I weren't too worn out afterwards!!!

Doing parachute games...

All the kids are inside this giant "birthday balloon"!

A happy girl ready to celebrate!

Being sung to by her friends...

Blowing out the candles!

Opening the gifts from her friends. We were all so amazed at how nicely all the friends sat and watched Ella....maybe they were just too tired! Isabella really enjoyed the gift opening and the gifts. She took her time and all her friends made the appropriate "oohs and aahs" over all the fun presents. It was really quite cute!!