Pool Party: Happy 5th Birthday Macie Claire!

I know I say it every year, and I am not going to pretend I won't say it next year, but how on earth can she possibly be FIVE YEARS OLD????? It seems like yesterday she was a tiny baby and I was trying to figure out how to juggle a new baby and a 3 year old who was used to having my undivided attention. Now my babies are 5 and 8! I do miss those sweet baby snuggles, but I can honestly say that I love the stage we are in! My kids are potty trained, entertain themselves, and most importantly... they sleep through the night!!!! Well... most of the time... when there isn't a storm...with thunder. Now- if I can only get Brenna to figure out how to tie her own stinking shoes, I will consider myself a successful mom! (Note to self in 5 years when I have a teenager- remember when your biggest worry was teaching Brenna how to tie her own shoes??!!)
But back to the birthday girl!!!
We had her party on Saturday at the clubhouse in our neighborhood. It was scheduled for Pops and Memaw's house and she wanted to just have cake and play outside with her friends.

But since we have gotten like 10 inches of rain in the last 7 days, that didn't happen. I think I was more upset than she was because this meant I had to figure out how to ENTERTAIN 7 kids for 2 hours! Not my cup of tea. But- we made it work!
Macie wanted Rainbow party with a rainbow cake AND chocolate cupcakes. SO- on Friday night I started baking. And baking. And baking.

I should have used 3 cake mixes, but oh well. I made 2 work. And honestly, 3 would have made the cake HUGE. 2 was pretty tall.

I did a simple decoration of M&M's.

On Saturday morning I got busy making play dough that was going to be out main activity for the party.

I made 4 double batches of play dough! I am pretty sure my right arm could bench press a Buick after stirring that stuff!
The story of that play dough recipe is one of my favorites. Before I got married, some great ladies gave me a bridal luncheon. In the invites they sent out, they included a recipe card for each guest to bring me their favorite recipe. My Aunt Kim, being the NON cook she is, gave me the recipe for play dough! I laughed at the time. But in all honesty- I have used that recipe more than any other that I got that day! And it was a huge hit at the party! I took all kinds of cookie cutters and rolling pins and they had a blast!
The cake table turned out super cute- if I do say so myself!

I was pretty impressed with how the candles looked on the cake!

The cupcakes, that Macie insisted she needed.....

And the rainbow fruit tray!! I'm totally not a crafty person- but I thought this turned out cute!

This girl... I love her.

The kiddos all started out at the play dough...

From the left...

Tia, Brenna, Maylee, Macie, Kinsley, and Wyatt.

Next up was a balloon game. We tied balloons to strings and tied it to their waist. Then told them to sit on them to pop them. Seemed like a fun idea.... But I should have tried this one out first. Because we didn't blow the balloons up enough and they wouldn't pop! It was hysterical!

I finally got a fork and popped them!

The last thing we did was hippidy hop races!

Notice Macie still has her balloon tied to her!

By this time, they had worked up an appetite, so.... Cake time!

I love how she is looking at her rainbow cake in this picture!

And one last picture of the cake because, well, I was proud of it! :-)

Graddy kept himself busy feeding baby Brycen.

And Macie's favorite part...PRESENTS!

She got so many great things! Thank you all for her wonderful gifts!!

These kids- I love them all!

And I especially love how Wyatt wanted in the picture, but he didn't want to be TOO close to those girls!

It was a fun party! Thank you all for coming to help us celebrate our big girl!

Her Daddy had to work on her birthday, so he gave her birthday spankings to her last night.

She giggled the whole time!

Since today is her actual birthday, I decorated her door, as I do for both kids on their birthday. Only this year, I realized too late that I didn't have any balloons- oops! So she just got streamers.

And I had her birthday donut cake all ready when she woke up! (Traditions with these two kids can't be broken apparently!)