photo share: spidergirl's 7th birthday

it's been 49 days since spidergirl's party (47 since she turned SEVEN!!!) and i still can't believe it!

(my husband's people: from left to right: Andrea (cousin), Suzi (cousin), Cindy (sister), Johnny (uncle))

suzi ended up reserving a party room (free to residents in her town--awesomesauce!) because spidergirl invited so many friends and family and we're so glad she did because only one person (of the 35 invited) wasn't able to make it! that kind of turnout for a party is unheard of!

but once everyone arrived it was pretty obvious why. my girl can brighten a room with just one smile and interact with a whole group of friends--she's definitely the life of the party, just like her daddy. she's very sensitive to other people and their feelings and goes out of her way to make sure everyone is included.


there were only three things she insisted on for her party. 1. playing bingo and having prizes for the winners, 2. having a pinata, and.....3. wearing a princess crown. we were happy to oblige to all three requests. so after munching on pizza and sipping some soda, we set the kids up with bingo cards, bingo chips, and a healthy amount of change from the adults pockets to use as markers when we ran out of bingo chips (ooooopsies!). you'd never guess that playing bingo with 18 kids that each game would last 20 minutes. crazy, but fun.

she picked and wrapped the prizes her friends would win. among them were a yo-yo, a bag of marbles, a pez dispenser, and.....oh, i can't remember the last one. oh, yeah. Flarp.

we almost didn't have a pinata, because we reserved this party room sight unseen. so when we got there we didn't have a clue how we were going to hang a pinata from the 15 foot ceilings. but my dad pulled out his super awesome macguyver skills to rig up the rolling table storage cart and saved the day!

who ever knew that pinatas were so strong! 18 kids shuffled through the line twice beating that thing with all their might and it still didn't bust. so we resorted to each kid grabbing a string to pull hoping to open the hatch. no such luck. i think the mistake was having them all pull at once instead of one at a time. so back in line they went for another whack at it.

once everyone shuffled through the line one more time we let spidergirl have her way with it until the candy started flying. all 20 pounds of it! (so glad we weren't having a sleepover with all that sugar, LOL!)

then we sang and had cupcakes. she requested daddy's cupcakes. chocolate with chocolate, yellow with white, and marble with chocolate. she wanted chocolate with chocolate for herself decorated with butterfly toothpicks. easy peasy. for the toothpicks, i just raided my scrapbook supply and used a glue dot to attach the butterflies to the end of a toothpick. the back was covered with a punched circle. (butterflies from Pebbles, Inc. and Little Yellow Bicycle)


then it was time to open presents! and goodness gracious did she have a lot of them! family and friends spoiled her rotten with clothes, Littlest Pet Shops, games, movies, gift cards to Half Price Books and Chuck E Cheese, handmade art and the two most desired gifts......a tropical parrot mini pillow pet and Beyblades. spoiled.
her reactions were priceless. my camera skills in capturing them were not. ha.

one other thing she talked about more and more in the days leading up to her birthday was how much she hoped she was going to get a talking/singing birthday card. it's been a hope of hers since her sister got one a few birthdays ago. so, i grabbed her one that's absolutely awesome and she got a singing cupcake from grams & papa, too. i honestly think opening those was the highlight of her party for her. :) love how the little details delight her the most.

i also love how in every photo i have of her opening gifts (all 234 of them--photos, not gifts) she's surrounded by friends celebrating in her joy! i'm not gonna have to worry about this one making friends throughout the school years. she's got this one in the bag. my little social butterfly.

(two of spidergirl's cousins)

after presents it was time to get a little crazy in the photo booth! if you've been reading for a while you might remember when we did this with a different backdrop and super awesome mustache props for her 5th birthday too.


this time i just hung a full-size flat bed sheet and used clothespins to dangle 4 or 5 balloons on string and also to clip up a cupcake/doily liner garland. to make the garland, i just purchased a variety of colors/patterns/sizes of cupcake liner along with a pack of paper doilies. using a needle and embroidery floss, i strung them onto the thread alternating the direction in which they were going to make the garland appear fuller. an idea i saw on Pinterest.


the rest of the props were just from our dress-up/costume bin. green oversized glasses (Walmart), coke bottle glasses (Dollar Tree), clown nose (Ringling Bros. Circus), nerd glasses (leftover from 3-D movie, lenses popped out, medical tape on bridge), feather boa (Hobby Lobby).


100% awesomeness for next to nothing.


while most of us were cleaning up, daddy and papa had the honors of putting together Beyblades and entertaining the cousins. who knew a girl could love Beyblades so much!

(she said....."look mom, i'm a walrus.")

another birthday come and gone, way too quickly! happy birthday my little peanut! thank you for bringing so much laughter and joy to my life. :)