Claire's 2nd Birthday

 Claire turned two on the 5th, a mere five days after Amelia was born.  We had her grandparents, great grandparents, aunts and uncle over for our usual gift opening followed by cake and ice cream.  I went with an Elmo theme because well, Claire really likes Elmo (see her dressed as Elmo for Halloween this past year). After having a baby earlier in the week I was very grateful for our decision to keep the kids birthday celebrations simple while they're still young, otherwise I'm sure I wouldn't have felt like I could pull it off and then felt guilty for not having a celebration of some sort (or incredibly tired and grouchy if by some miracle I had pulled it off)!

This was the most restrained Melanie was during Claire's gift opening.  She was very "helpful" in that area ;)

Learning the joys of popping bubble wrap with Aunt Amber

 The cake and cupcakes.

I'm glad I decided on a simple cake (I used the image transfer technique) and had everything planned out by earlier in January (table ware purchased, Elmo picture printed off for image transfer, cake ingredients bought, gift taken care of) so aside from balloons the day of the party and Matt picking up a bag of ice we didn't have to leave the house for much of anything, which was nice since there was still a lot of snow and ice on the ground from the storm earlier in the week.

 Dad and Melanie helping blow out the candles

Mmmm...sugar!

And the resulting sugar crash

Happy Birthday Claire!