Jake's 2nd Birthday - The Monkey Party!

our little monkey

checking out the animal show

he would not sit still for the show!

me and my 2-year-old!

the birthday plates

the monkey cake I made for Jake!

banana candies

monkey cupcakes

banana chips

the drink table

don't these jars make for cute drinking glasses?

the party favors

party snacks

signage

more signage :)

monkey centerpieces

our little monkey checking out a real monkey!

Jake's birthday banner

the water bottles

cake time!

we helped him blow out his candle

eating his cake with a fork

family photo time

special birthday shirt

climbing down the stairs

the birthday boy

giving his friend Avery a hug goodbye! so adorable!

My biggest regret from Jake's 1st birthday party is that we do not have great photos to remember the day. We took a few so-so photos with our camera but we are not the best photographers, we don't have the best camera, and we didn't have time to take very many pictures while we were busy celebrating Jake turning 1. That's why I was so excited to hire my friend Mignonne of Miggy Photography (check out her photography blog here: http://miggyhood.blogspot.com/search/label/photography ) to take photos at Jake's 2nd birthday party. She recently launched her photography business and she really took some amazing photos of Jake's big day!

I requested that she capture some of the details (I go crazy with all the details while party planning!) and she went above and beyond my expectations. She captured our dessert table in its finest, along with everything else down to the custom water bottle labels I had made. And she even managed to get a great family photo which is extremely hard with our squirmy worm - he will NOT sit still for photos! Thanks Miggy!!!

As you can see, our little monkey had a blast at his monkey-themed bash, and every time he sees a monkey now, he says "monkey cake!" I guess the monkey cake made a big impression :) Having the party at the zoo was so much fun, and even though Jake wouldn't sit still for the animal show, he liked checking out the animals at the zoo (especially the owl and, of course, the monkeys!) I refrained from posting pics of all his friends who came to the party because I don't have permission from all the mommies, but from the looks of the photos, his buddies had a great time too! And how cute is that last photo of Jake and Avery hugging? (I do have permission from my friend Jen, Avery's mommy). They are such buddies and are always excited to see each other at our Monday and Thursday playgroups!

Jake had his 2 year check up last week, and here are his current stats: he is over 36" tall (in the 95th percentile for height!) and weighs 29 lbs. (between 50th and 75th percentile for weight). I'm so excited that Jakey is still tall! I plugged his stats into the babycenter.com "child height predictor" and it says Jake will be 6'2", so we'll see if that comes true...

Poor Jake had to get two shots and a blood test (taken out of his toe!) at his appt. but he was a trooper and recovered quickly. He was not a fan of the nurse though! His development is right on track and our next check up will be in March when he is 2 1/2. Although that sounds far away now, I bet it will be here before we know it!

Halloween is approaching way too fast and I'm so excited, but have so much work to do! We started decorating the yard over the weekend and luckily we didn't get too far because the rain and the wind this week would have done some damage to our graveyard. Jake is loving all the Halloween decor and talks about the pumpkins, rats, spiders, etc. He even says "bye bye" to the witch in the front yard when we leave the house now! Even the stuff that scared him at first doesn't bother him anymore. He is adjusting really well to our scary house, and I try to make it as harmless as possible. "Say hi to the skeleton man. Mommy is going to give the skeleton man a high five. Isn't that cool?" He just thinks the scary decor is normal! Which is great because we want him to have fun with it just like we do. At his check up, his pediatrician asked him to name a few animals and he pointed to the bird with its wings outstretched and said "bat!" This kid has Halloween on the brain. And I couldn't be happier!

Oh, and in case you were wondering, I did not go to garage sales on the 24th because it was the day of Jake's party, but I did go on Saturday (October 1st) and they sucked. Big time. The only thing I bought was this toy helicopter for $1. Jake loves it! But that was it. My mom didn't even get anything. This Saturday my mom will be out of town and Joe is playing in a work-related basketball tournament so I won't get a chance to go. Hopefully, we'll resume our garage saling next weekend. And hopefully, the sales will be much better!