Lola's 1st Birthday Party

I feel like such a bad mummy...

I've only just realised now while posting about Ava's birthday that I never got around to posting about Lola's birthday back in October. Let's put that slip up down to the stress of an international move with small children.

So, here it is, more than a little belated, Lola's 1st birthday party...

Lola's 1st birthday fell just before our move to America. This made organising a party a little tricky as I was so busy with the move but with the help from friends we got there in the end and had a lovely day.

Lola's 1st birthday party was also our farewell party. As we had already moved out of our house the party was held in Botanic Park in Adelaide. We were very lucky to have a beautiful sunny day.

Now, as I was so busy with the move I didn't get a chance to make up paper invites to post out like I would normally do. Instead I decided to set up a Facebook event for the party. Not really the best option in hindsight as I didn't count on the number of people who don't check Facebook regularly. Oops!

Lola and I had a little photo shoot on the beach to use as the event image on Facebook. I didn't count on the image not being large enough for anyone to see the detail. This seems to be the one image on Facebook that you can't click on to enlarge!

The image from the Facebook invite

For Lola's birthday cake I needed to stick with something simple given the fact that I no longer had a kitchen or all my baking gear. I went with a simple round chocolate cake and decorated it with KitKats all around the outside and Smarties on top. I found this idea on Pinterest and just had to copy it.

Lola's birthday cake

Singing Happy Birthday

Time to cut the cake

Mmm... chocolate cake 

Delicious chocolatey mess

Yum!

Lola and Nanna

Practising walking with Nanna and Aunty Kerry

As we were just about to move overseas we asked that everyone who wanted to give Lola a gift contribute towards buying her a set of PlayShapes and ShapeMaker blocks from Miller Goodman. Kim purchased these in San Francisco and had them waiting for Lola when we arrived. I had been wanting these for the girls for a long time but they're quite pricey so this seemed like the perfect opportunity to get something extra special for Lola. Thanks to everyone who contributed!

Ava helps (a very tired) Lola open her ShapeMaker and PlayShapes blocks

Lola stacking her ShapeMaker blocks

Ava with a few PlayShapes creations