Choo Choo - Carter's Turning 2!!!

We had a small birthday party for Carter Sunday afternoon at Homewood Park. Since all of Carter's grandparents live over 9 hours away we thought we would take the birthday party to them so they could all celebrate with Carter. I know Carter enjoyed it - and I am pretty sure the grandparent's did too. We were sad Mimi couldn't join us because she was battling bronchitus and that Nana was out of town for work.

I am going to share the party mainly by pictures, but looking back at them, I realized I didn't get a family shot of Adam, Carter and I or of Carter with each of his grandparents. I guess we were just having too much fun. Enjoy the pictures!

It was a very warm and muggy afternoon at Homewood Park, but thankfully the rain held off and there was a nice breeze so no one seemed to mind the heat too much. Our pavilion was very close to the playground so we let the kids have some playtime. A few of them wore their conductor hats to play.

Cousin Jack...


Sweet Caroline...


JT on the Elephant...


and Quinn who started smiling as soon as he saw me with the camera...


After the kiddos (and supervising parents) were thoroughly exhausted, it was snack time. I found this cute idea for serving the snacks in a choo choo train online.



The containers are from a toy organizer we have had in Carter's playroom. I got it at Target a while back. We spray painted wooden circles from Michael's black and connected them with pipe cleaners. The smoke stack is an old Puff snack container that has been filled with jelly beans and used as a shaker in Carter musical instrument collection. I covered the jar with black electrical tape and Adam constructed the smoke with aluminum foil covered in cotton balls. We covered several of Carter's toy building blocks with aluminum foil for the front of the train. If you know me, you know I always enjoy a good craft.



After snack time, it was time for the kiddos to do a quick craft. I just coulnd't help myself. Carter is really into letters and the alphabet these days, so Adam had this great idea of having the kids make a train with their name spelled out on individual cars. Here is a shot of Carter's finished product.



Finally it was cupcake time!

I ordered these cute cupcake toppers from a store on Etsy. She was absolutely wonderful to work with and has all kinds of themes to choose from. Click here to check out her store.





I am pretty sure Carter enjoyed his cupcake. What do you think?



Jack sure did enjoy watching Carter enjoy his cupcake.



Carter wasn't the only one to end up with a little bit of icing on his face.



All the kiddos went home with a conductor hat (thank you Oriental Trading) and some play doh with a train cookie cutter. The gift tags were from the same Etsy store - Ten Candles.



After the party, we headed back to Carter's cousins' house for dinner and to open a few presents.



It was a really fun afternoon. I am not sure I would want to throw a birthday party more than once a year (ok, maybe twice a year - one for Carter and one for baby brother), but I think Carter had a blast which is the best present of all to me.

That night, we loaded up the car and headed to Poppa's house. Carter crashed in his carseat in record time and woke up to all sorts of fun the next morning.