Curious Caiden and The Birthday Bash

It used to be that when I went out shopping and fell in love with an amazing pair of shoes, I would purchase the footwear first and then buy an ensemble to go along with it. It was kind of a backwards methodology, but I always built my outfit from the bottom up.

I don’t shoe shop often anymore, but I have adopted the same methodology for planning my children’s birthday parties. I build their celebrations from the cake up. It usually begins right after the last birthday is celebrated. Then, throughout the remainder of the year, I page through magazines, cookbooks, and websites seeking inspiration for something cute, feasible, and, most importantly, better than the last cake that I created. I stockpile my ideas in a binder that I keep in my kitchen and look at each frequently. As the birthday comes closer and closer, I narrow down my options to ones that are particularly applicable to my child at that stage. Yes, there are a MILLION Thomas cakes out there, but given my child’s obsession, I think I can hold on to that one for another year. Blue’s Clues? That one was simple enough and boy could I have with thematic activities, but Caiden goes through spurts of being bored with that character. Once the cake for that year is selected, I develop the homemade invites in which clever wordplay is a MUST, and then burden myself with a bunch of obsessive, not-really-necessary, self-inflicted late-night “homework” deciding on décor, activities, the food spread, and favors.

For Caiden’s first birthday, I was enamored by a cake that a friend of mine did based off of Eric Carle’s The Very Hungry Caterpillar. I stole her idea for the cake and then ran off with the rest. As our guests ate their way through the same foods the caterpillar munched on throughout the text, the kids created their own caterpillars to take home using a simple template and pom-poms. The following year was the “Year of the Mega Block”. Giant primary colored blocks decorated our home, I carved and sculpted a series of building block cakes out of cakes baked in loaf pans and decorated with assorted chewy candies (PS- it is nearly IMPOSSIBLE to locate blue Laffy Taffy…), the kids could create structures of their own, and I was far wiser and ordered pizza for all that year. : )

So now what? Caiden was turning 3 this year. Although he probably wouldn’t remember all of the painstaking details and effort that I invested into his party, he is at a stage where some of the memories will stick. I wanted to make this not just another birthday to remember, but, quite possibly, the first birthday that he would remember. When I think about my little guy and reflect upon all that he has become over the past year, all that he had done (who can forget the baby powder incident?), and all that he loves in general, the answer was obvious to me and allowed me to dive into one of my favorite pages in my idea binder: The Monkey Cupcake.

This year we invited our closest family members to “Go Bananas with Us” as we celebrated “Our Little Monkey’s”’ 3^rd birthday. And what character were we going to “monkey around” with? Curious George, of course! That beloved character is a classic portrayal of what life is like for our little guy—always well-intentioned, driven by inquisitiveness, and, usually making a mess. After baking my chocolate-banana cupcakes, I decorated their 24 little faces with a homemade ganache, Nilla wafers, mini chocolate chips, and Fudge Stripe Right-Bites.

Our home was minimally decorated (because it is quite difficult to hang streamers with an almost 5-month-old attached to you), but what was chosen played off of the bright yellows, red, and blues so commonly associated with George. I created an activity station for our youngest guests with George-themed coloring & connect-the-dot pages (thanks PBSKids.org!), as well as Caid’s collection of George books, toys, and games. Because of my kids’ varied eating and napping schedules, we skipped having a meal together and went straight for the good stuff: Cupcakes and Make-Your-Own Banana Splits. Each child was able to bring home a sheet of Curious George “tattoos” and (my favorite find) and Curious George foam mask that I personalized on the back with each kid’s name (“Curious Caiden” prefers to have Mommy wear his mask, though). My little monkey had an absolute blast playing with all of his family and tearing through his gifts. It was a great deal of work to prepare and execute, but seeing the smile on my 3-year-old’s face made it all worth it and I would do it again in a heartbeat for him.

At the close of the day, once the gift wrap was cleaned up, the cupcakes demolished, and the toys were out of their boxes, I curled up on the couch with Caiden and read to him from his Curious George Treasury. I stroked his hair as he wore—what else but—his monkey pajamas and couldn’t help but replay the day that he was brought into this world in my mind. That afternoon was quite similar to today in the sense of the extensive hours of planning and effort, the chaos that surrounded his actual birth, the laboring and commotion, and then, the beautiful end product that I held closely in my arms. That “bundle” is now much bigger than the 7 pound 10 ounce one that he once was. But he still has the sweetest smile, the kindest disposition, and my heart in his hands.

(Caiden: Then and Now)

Hmmmm, now what to do for Ryan’s 1^st Birthday…