Evee turns 2!

For posterity’s sake, I thought it would be nice to put a brief description of Evee’s 2nd birthday party up here. We threw her a My Little Pony themed party at my brother’s house in Cleveland. Last year we only had friends at her party in Ithaca, so this year we decided to concentrate on having family there. Of course, most of the foursome made it (thanks Ash and KJ! We missed you Hayl!) and are considered family 🙂 The party started off exactly like Evee’s 1st birthday party, with the star of the show napping instead of greeting guests:

It’s my party, I can nap if I want to.

Josh and I tried to keep to our tradition of making her main gifts. We built this barn together and I painted it. This was built using scrap wood that we bought for <$2 at our local reuse center, and a couple of hinges and screws. Half of the barn roof opens on 2 sets of hinges so clumsy fingers can get inside the barn to play with the animals. As always, I’m so happy to find that we can come up with much higher quality toys for much less than the cost of a new toy by building it ourselves. We bought a tub of plastic farm animals for inside and a few well-sized My Little Pony figurines. She was in seventh heaven 🙂

A simple, sturdy barn made by Mom and Dad

I also crocheted her a cute little Doctor’s kit bag to replace the crappy plastic one that came with the Doctor’s kit she received for Christmas. The plastic one became completely unusable after she stepped on it a few times, but I imagine this one will last her a while!

The talented Miss (not-Miss-for-long) Ashley created her My Little Pony themed birthday cake from scratch, and it was definitely the hit of the party. Two layers of chocolate cake with chocolate ganache between them, and yummy homemade frosting made for a delicious birthday treat! She also made some awesome rainbow cupcakes using more of that chocolate ganache as frosting 🙂

The gorgeous, homemade cake 🙂

Evee had a wonderful time opening gifts, eating cake and playing with her cousins Lily and Ryan. Josh and I bought her a twin bed to transition into from the crib, and the My Little Pony plushies and bedding made it into a toddler paradise. After the transition, she went from never sleeping through the night to now sleeping through the night more than 50% of the time (with only one wake-up on nights that she does get up). So it was a happy birthday for me, too!

Toddler squee 🙂