Callie's 5th Birthday

It's hard to believe that October 2, 2012 marked Callie's last day as a four-year-old. She had been looking forward to her birthday for quite some time, so it was easy to get her to smile for a picture the night before she turned five. Fortunately she did not decide to wake up at 5:58am on October 3 to commemorate the actual five year mark.

What has become a nice tradition is that on Callie's actual birthday we bring cupcakes to Callie's class so that she can share the big day with her friends at day care. Of course, that especially means sharing her special day with Maddie, who has had the honor to celebrate every one of Callie's five birthdays with her. It still is pretty crazy to think about.

But this birthday was going to be much different than previous ones. No longer would Callie's birthday be marked by a simple family gathering.

Instead, we decided that the time had come to have an actual birthday party. And what better place to celebrate a fall birthday than at an orchard? So we rented a spot at Evan's Orchard here in town and got ready to have some fun. Once the tables were decorated, Callie and Reese were ready to welcome the guests.

We had a lot of activities planned. To kick things off we let the kids decorate their own individual pumpkins. They had a number of sticker options and could make their pumpkin into a cat, a monster, or your basic old jack-o-lantern. We figured handing out stickers to decorate would be much safer than handing out carving knives at a children's birthday party.

Callie was pretty proud of the cat she had created. And at this point, she was having an absolute blast knowing that all of this was for her very own birthday party. And of course, that made her parents happy. For the rest of the month we had a reminder of the day since the cat pumpkin sat on the front porch right through Halloween.

In fact, all of the kids seemed to enjoy their pumpkins and were more than willing to pose with their respective creations.

As you can see, we had quite a crowd at the party. But all in all, the kids were extremely well behaved and the orchard provided a perfect setting for Callie's first big party.

The next activity was a private wagon ride through the orchard. Here we see Callie posing with her friends Claire, Elizabeth, and Murphy. We were pretty impressed with Callie's ability to manage spending time with all of her friends who came to the party. It is not an easy thing to do, and she did a great job making sure to hang out with everyone who came...

...fortunately that also included her parents. As many parents are quick to tell us, these years go by so quickly, so never pass up the opportunity to snuggle with your kid. Done and done.

Once the ride through the orchard was complete, the time had come for the big event. Dessert. Instead of an elaborate and beautiful cake made and decorated by Sarah, Callie chose to celebrate her fifth birthday with elaborate and beautiful cupcakes made by Sarah.

The birthday girl handled being the center of attention quite well and did a very good job handing out the cupcakes. And once the cupcakes were consumed and the presents were unwrapped, everyone could still run around the orchard. Once everyone had gone home and we packed up the car, Callie was tired but happy. She told us that it was the best day ever. It is safe to say that the day was a success all around.