Last Friday, Sebastian turned three years old! He’s turned into such a character and I just love his little personality. He’s sweet, silly, and energetic. He loves to run, which makes playing soccer his favorite. He likes putting together puzzles and reading books. He  has also started embracing his sassy side, becoming more defiant than usual but that’s life with a threenager!

My birthday is New Year’s Eve and this year I turned 32. As a kid, it was awesome because I got to have a party or celebrate however I wanted and then stay up until the ball dropped, drinking sparkling grape juice. As an adult, it isn’t quite as glamorous simply because I now have to compete with the holiday. Kids always come to your birthday party because there are no bars or clubs or better things to do. Your party IS the thing to do. As an adult, you have to make your party pretty enticing to convince your adult friends to stop by before heading to the other festivities. I’ve been throwing a birthday/NYE party for myself for several years now and these are the reasons why I always try to have an amazing spread, fun decorations, a fun activity, and plenty of booze at my parties. With the baby expected to arrive in the spring, this was my last party for a while. But we made it pretty awesome!

The Food

Our menu consisted of black bean sliders with chipotle aioli, charcuterie tray, sausage balls, mini corn cakes with smoked salmon and dill, a veggie tray, a fruit tray, a dessert tray from our local Fresh Market, and some bomb-diggity short rib queso dip that I didn’t get a picture of because it was in a slow cooker on the counter.

We accompanied our charcuterie tray with cornichons, honey-roasted mixed nuts, and green olives.

In addition to all of this food, our friends also brought side dishes and drinks so we were definitely set on delicious noms all night!

The Decorations

I’ve been using the same decorations for years. I got them pretty cheap at Party City and box them up after the party and keep them safe until the next time. I think they work pretty well but Nick hates them because they do look so cheap. Oh, well. They’ll have to do until I can afford some fancy schmancy decorations, which will probably be never so plastic decorations it is!

The Fun Activity

This is another activity I do every year: setting up a resolution station. This year I simply taped some black craft paper on the wall and outlined it in strips of leftover glittery wrapping paper. I set out gold sharpies for my guests to write down their New Year’s Resolutions if they felt up to it. I have several resolutions this year that I’ll be sharing with you all tomorrow.

I’m really grateful to all of my friends that were able to make it this year. Like I mentioned above, it’s the last soirée we’ll be having since our little man is coming, so it was nice to feel like I went out with a bang!

Last couple selfie of 2016. It’ll be ‘just the two of us’ for only a few more months!

On Saturday, Nick and I hosted a last-minute surprise birthday party for our neighbor, Stephen, as orchestrated by his wife, Hannah. We like our neighbors very much so we were excited to be a part of the celebration and were more than happy to provide a space (our backyard) and our event-planning ‘expertise’.

I threw together a few decorations that I use for my own birthday parties each year and Hannah invited a few of Stephen’s friends, who parked down the street and then hid in the corner of our porch so they could jump out and yell ‘Surprise!’  Hannah ordered some BBQ, bought lots of booze, and Nick made homemade brownies, and a great time was had by all.

Drink up! There were about 10 attendees to our surprise party extravaganza and we weren’t sure if we could drink all of this beer, but we happily accepted the challenge.

Nick made homemade brownies and then kicked it up a notch by making his own stencils and decorating them with powered sugar. It was adorable – and we got a lot of compliments.

Challenge accepted and successfully completed!

The best part of the night was that the furbabies had so much fun that they were tuckered out by the end of the night! And they were just as cute as a button.

I didn’t get a chance to take any outfit photos over the weekend, but the next time you see me, it’ll probably be in my new location. More on that to come!