we have a birthday coming up

and as usual I've left everything to the last minute to do. I had pretty much decided on no party. I mean, of course we always have a little family party... I like to make a big deal out of birthdays.
Birthdays = big celebration in my book.
But then at the last minute (last Sunday to be exact) I decided I couldn't not do anything special for Sawyer's second birthday. And his birthday is Friday. Yeah, I like to plan ahead.

I have to tell you I did try to plan ahead this year. I had sat down quite a few times in the past few months trying to come up with party ideas. I like to celebrate birthdays and I like to be creative. Not that our parties are big and elaborate or spendy or involving a lot of people. I mean, after all, Sawyer really only has 2 friends here (and they're both girls (both named Lucy by the way) and they are both almost 6 months age difference from Sawyer in either direction). So I'm not talking about parties like renting out the pool or going to Chuck E Cheese or anything. We've always been more along the lines of nice little homemade parties with a few friends.

Savannah's First birthday was probably the biggest thing we did. There were more than fifty people invited and it was a big open house type thing with lots of food and all of our friends and family just coming and going throughout the afternoon to visit with the birthday girl and celebrate her first year with us. Savannah was the first grandchild on all sides of the family and most of our friends had yet to have kids, so she was kind of specially in the spotlight.
For her second birthday we had a little family and just a couple of friends join us for little lunch at our favorite kid restaurant, Peanut Butter and Ellie's.
For her third birthday she had a Carousel birthday party at the Riverfront Carousel we lived near. We all met and rode the carousel, had a little party with pizza and a pinata outside in the Riverfront park. It was so simple and fun.
Last year for her fourth birthday, we had a baking party. This was by far my favorite. I shared about that one here.

Sawyer's first birthday last year was a little puppy themed party. It was a nice change from the last couple of pink girlie parties we did. It was fun and simple. Just a couple of friends and letting the boys play together.

So this year.
I tried coming up with good themes early on. Like I've said before, I don't like to have to have a big party, but it just doesn't feel like a kid party without some sort of theme. I thought about all of the things he's "into" right now; trucks, all the cool stuff I could do with a construction trucks theme... bugs... frogs... Elmo... Well, not really Elmo, but sadly that is one of his favorite things right now. And I wanted something he'd be excited about. Anyway, I just wasn't "feeling" anything. So I had pretty much given up and said we'll just stick with our little non-themed family party.
Then last weekend it was bugging me that I couldn't think of anything to do for my little boy that he could get super excited about, so I started brainstorming more and decided that with his golf ball obsession (and sports in general) lately that I should run with that theme. So I got all excited and sent out an evite to the few families we know around here and started planning a Golf party. Problem is, there isn't much out there for golf party stuff or ideas, and what is out there is like Happy Retirement golf themed plates and napkins. So not only did I wait until the last possible minute to plan a party, now I have to be extra creative and make up all our decorations and games and cake and stuff by myself. Oh well, I guess I work best under pressure.

I did manage to find some random golf ball napkins at our party store, so I'm using those and a fake grass table cloth and just running with the colors green and white and red with golf balls and tees and golf course flags. We're just going to have a little party here with snacks and games and cake. I'm not usually one for organized games at parties, but we went over to Savannah's friend's little Halloween party last weekend and they played a bunch of games and the kids all loved it, so I decided I should at least try. I think I'm going to make up a little pin the tail on the donkey kind of thing with a ball and hole on a green, and do a spoon race with the golf ball and things like that. Hey, if you have any preschool/toddler appropriate party games that could incorporate anything golf, send them my way.
We also got this for Sawyer to open on his birthday, so we will probably have that out for the kids to play around with. It's going to be a nice sunny day, so I'm assuming we can be outside pretty much the whole time.
After the party, (which we're keeping short) we are going to take Sawyer out to play a real live Mini-golf course and spend some time playing there. Everyone we invited to the party is welcome to join us there afterwards as well. I think Sawyer will have a blast.

Now I just have to figure out what I'm doing about a cake. Why oh why do I do this to myself?