Happy 1st Birthday pt 2

After presents it was cake time!!!
This is her big cake that I got from Sam's. Ella LOVES animals so it was perfect for her. Plus it matched the color theme I had going-lavender and pink. (This pic makes the writing look blue but it really is a light purple)

Okay, this is where the picture in my head turned out WAY different than real life. I wanted to make Ella a little 'smash cake' all her own that matched her big cake. So I bought these mini cake pans to make her own 3 layer cake. The cake itself turned out great! It was just a polka dot cake mix, but it looked all yummy and moist.
The look of the cake, on the other hand, didn't turn out quite how I imagined it. But, my sister Kari was able to turn it into a decent looking cake. (No offense to Kari, because this was not her fault at all! She did great for what she had to work with, if it'd have been me I'd have thrown it at the wall in frustration) She is really good at decorating cakes, I wish I had pics of the masterpieces she has made for her kids. The problem was mine-my frosting was terrible! It kept melting everywhere! We tried cooling it in the fridge to no avail. We stacked the layers of cake on each other and got the coat around the cake smooth, but slowly the frosting between the layers started seeping out and making the cake sag and tip. The hearts that she had put on the sides started sliding down the cake and the borders that she piped around the top and bottom spread and kind of melted together. I was imagining a pure white base-with pastel pink hearts and lavender edging. Well it's not quite what I ended up with. I still put the purple Elephant on top(fitting right?!) which was cute. Looking at it makes me laugh; I wish you could see the idea in my head and compare it to the real thing, if you could you'd laugh too.
Anyway here it is :)

Then I thought I would make the cute swirly cupcakes that you see everywhere. Well because of time and bad frosting that didn't happen at all. My sister Jana was able to quickly spread some frosting over them and give them a quick decorating. Not what I imagined but it works right :0)

Despite these issues the cake part was still great!
Here is Ella checking out her cake. I love her scrunchy nose face in this pic!
Everyone singing "Happy Birthday"
Blowing out the candle, well Mom trying to show her how to anyway :)
Mmm, sticking her finger in the frosting at tasting it! Yummy!
Presenting her her very own cake!
She goes for the toy first!
A little taste of the frosting
She didn't really like it. But I don't blame her. It was REALLY sweet frosting, too sweet.
Basically she just kept grabbing chunks of cake and frosting, then shaking her hand to get it off.
Blurry hands="get it off me"
She did that until she had destroyed the cake. It looks like she ate a lot of the cake but she really didn't. She ate like 3 bites, 3 little bites. The cake is spread all over the floor, in her seat, basically everywhere but in her mouth. (Hey as a Mom though, I don't mind that too much. It would've been A LoT of sugar to eat which would've been tummy ache and a LOnG night, so I'm glad ;)
After destruction, she was cool with chewing on the elephant
After a quick bath, she hung out with her cousin Kaytlyn. That pretty much rounds out her party. It was so much fun. It was great to watch her open presents, flip the cake around, ya know the whole thing! I'm glad that everything didn't turn out as planned because it makes it more fun that way. The most important thing is Ella; my sweet baby girl is one! I love her so much and I am so thankful for her!

After everyone had gone home, we were hanging out a little longer and Ella found these little cups my mom had.
We put them on her hands and she looked so confused like "Hey, where are my hands?!"
"Eh, no biggie, this works, I can still eat it this way!"

Happy 1st Birthday!

February 16- One ~1~!
I can't believe the last year went by so fast! My little baby isn't a baby anymore! As sad as that is for me, it's really exciting too, because each day she gets cuter and smarter and does things that just melt my heart! Ella's birthday was quite the celebration! We went to Utah to celebrate her birthday with all the fam. I had all of these big dreams and plans of how I wanted her party to be, just ask Dan, I was dreaming this event up for weeks! But, because we weren't going to do it at our home, I couldn't do a lot of the organizing until we got to Utah. So the party turned into a mad rush to get everything completed, which resulted in many things not turning out how I had planned them in my head. But as mad as it was to get last minute details and how awful some of my ideas turned out, it was still a blast! Ella looked like she really enjoyed herself! So here goes the birthday:

Ella spent most of the day with her Daddy, they went to lunch with Grandma T., then they went to Aunt Tricia's to play. Once, they were back at Grandma V's it was hurry and get ready for the party!
I love all the tutu's that I've seen around, so back when I was pregnant and found out it was a girl, I started planning putting her in a tutu for her 1st birthday. So I scoured the internet for ideas and made her this sweet little tutu. I love it!! Ribbons, purple, pink & girlie, of course! She has been my little princess from the beginning so I made her princess shirt to match. I really wanted a special little party hat for her, so I made her little clippy party hat to match. One of my favorite things that you can't really see in the pictures is her piggy tails! I lOvE pig tails on little girls! Although, at the start of her party she seemed a little grumpy. We finally figured out that those sweet piggy tails were pulling her hair, so sadly then had to come out :( Oh well, she was still adorable and it made her personality match. Once they were out, she was a bright, cheery little girl again!
The Princess and Grandpa Vaughn
Ella and Aunt Jana-I don't know if she's giving hugs or trying to escape from the flashes of the camera, hehe!
When the girls found out Ella had a tutu, they all decided to wear theirs too! (I think there might have been some demanding their Moms go home and bring them!!! ;)
I think they are all sooo cute!
(By the way, don't you love the retro party hats Ella's cousins are wearing?! I found them in my Mom's basement, I think they are from a party when Jana was like 7, cool huh!)
Ella Bella (with Princess bib, of course) and Grandma Vaughn
Ella and Abby giving each other the stare down, while Payton and Parker play
I saw these really cute pull string pinatas and decided to make my own. This is partly where I got off track; it took a lot longer than I thought it would. But it was so worth it.
Ella was so cute pulling on those strings. (Sorry about my monster eyes in this photo, there isn't a yellow eye remover in my photo editor, so I couldn't figure out how to make them go away)
It turned out everyone got a turn to pull a on a string. The right string was the very last one to be pulled, but even then I didn't get it reinforced enough so the string broke and no candy came out! I ended up pulling the trap door open by hand.

After the Pinata it was present time!!! Wowee, Ella sure has lot of family who love her tonz, because she had a lot of presents!
See check out all of those gifts-and this is BEFORE some family had even arrived!
She was really funny opening presents, she would reach in the bag pull out the item and if it was clothes it immediately got tossed to the side; she didn't even bother to give it a second look. There were a few outfits that I had to pick up off the floor to see because she tossed them aside so quickly.
She had the drill down pat, see look how intent she is on getting that paper off to see what is inside. (sorry these pics are a little blurry, my camera had some issues)

Santa

I was just found this pic from back at Christmas time and though I had to share. We took Ella to the mall so she could get her picture taken with Santa. Needless to say, I don't think she is very fond of him, wouldn't you agree? :)

Random Fun

Feb 5th
...She licked the platter clean...

Feb 6th
From sweet blue eyes
to Bedhead


Feb 7th
If ya don't know Ella she does this thing where she balls up her fists, scrunches her face, and goes "Ugghhh!!" Then she laughs at herself because she knows she being funny. Well this is what it looks like:
She also likes to stick her finger up her nose for the same reason-for a laugh. She has the best manners :)


Feb 8th
Popsicles-"Oh boy that's cold!"
"Here Dad you have some too!"
"This is so fun!"

January

Jan. 8, 2010
Here is Ella with all of her Christmas Treasures and our tree back at home. I think it was a pretty good Christmas for her ;)

Jan. 15, 2010
This is Ella with her first band aid. She kept trying to pull it off. She was kind of confused about what this sticky thing on her finger was.

Jan 21, 2010
Piggytails!!!

January 23, 2010
Happy Big 30 Dan!!
T
The party crowd
The cake- He's too old for individual candles, it's onto decade candles now! :)
The Presents-Before
Presents-After
Happy Birthday Dan! I love you!

January 24, 2010
Bathing Beauty, don't ya love the hair!

January 30, 2010
Ella falls asleep in the strangest positions