John turned 1 on September 22, 2015. How a year flew by so quickly, is beyond me. And now its been another almost 6 months and I'm finally sharing all the pictures!

Erik took the time to make a special birthday breakfast for our sweet little one year old by cutting up some blueberry pancakes and arranging them on a plate for John when he woke up. The boys don't usually get to see him before he goes to work. It was the sweetest thing. I was so excited that I took it out of the fridge to look at it once he told me. And I dropped it on the floor. No joke. I'm the worst mom & wife ever. So below is my re-creation of the nice birthday breakfast Erik made for John.


John really enjoyed it.


And then he threw it on the floor. Like mother, like son!


How big is John John? So big! He's 1!


There's our blond haired, blue eyed little 1 year old with the sweet little curls.

We had a small family birthday party to celebrate John once Erik got home from work. We had a very fancy dinner of grilled cheese sandwiches with french fries and vegetables. I made cinnamon sugar apple birthday donuts, in lieu of birthday cake (since we were celebrating my birthday and having a birthday party all within just a few days of this).

 I decorated the house while the boys were napping so that we could enjoy the decorations for more than just the weekend.


John seems thrilled with his dinner in this next one.

Birthday donuts!



Will is the master of biting his sandwiches into shapes. I believe this one was a dog.



All my boys getting ready to sing happy birthday!


And here I am with my little birthday boy. When you're the one always taking the pictures you have to remember sometimes to actually get into the pictures yourself. I love these shots of us together. He really does give the sweetest kisses.







We had John's 1st Birthday party with family & friends on Saturday, September 27.

If there is anything that John likes to do a lot of, it is eating. You can tell by his pudgy little thighs and his squeezable cheeks that the boy LOVES his food. So, when I was trying to think of a theme for his 1st birthday party it only seemed fitting that we host a Very Hungry Caterpillar birthday for our very hungry little 1 year old.

I found an invitation I liked on Pinterest and went to work designing it so that I could e-vite our family & friends.



I also made the birthday boy a onesie to wear the day of his party. It was a labor of love with my enemy the sewing machine but I think it turned out pretty darn cute! I had the fabric, buttons and onesie all on hand already so I was able to make him this birthday shirt at no additional cost, which is always awesome in my book!



And here we are on the day of the party with our cute little caterpillar!





Behind us you can see the little gift bags we gave to the little kids that came to the party. I printed up a Hungry Caterpillar coloring page, gave them a small pack of crayons and some treats. And I packed up some treats to the big kids that came as well. It's always nice to have the other kids open something when the birthday boy opens his presents so they don't feel too left out.




I found this cake idea on Pinterest (I know, so shocking) and my mom ordered it from a local bakery. The red Caterpillar head was John's smash cake and the rest of the cupcakes made up the body. It was so cute and it was really easy to serve without having to cut a cake!





As you can see from the photos below, he had no problem diving in to his first official birthday cake. I'd say more, but the photos pretty much speak for themselves.








And our cake covered birthday boy with Grandma Karen and Grandpa Joe.




A family picture with a photobomb by Uncle Tim! I love how John is holding up his cake for the camera.



Another of just the 4 of us. I just love these guys more than words.




I tend to forget to take pictures of the decorations on the day of the party because I never budget enough time for myself to do so. This was the day after once all of the presents had been opened. I made a Hungry Caterpillar out of the paper globes from Target and hung a couple of streamers below it along with some red & green accessories and a birthday balloon.



I had the red tablecloths already on hand - I like having fabric ones so that I can wash them rather than using something once and throwing it away. The green runner is one I usually use for Christmas and it worked great with the theme colors. The flowers were just from Walmart and were fun bright colors to match the rest of the decorations.




This is my fancy caterpillar that I made from paper plates and some pipe cleaners.


Another simple flower arrangement along with the food cards I made for the party. I bought some clip art on Etsy (for cheap) and designed and printed them myself. We had sassy ham sandwiches (which are the best sandwiches you will ever have) along with pigs in a blanket and pasta salad. The rest of the food theme followed the Hungry Caterpillar and what he ate so we had cheese, sausage, watermelon, strawberries, oranges, cupcakes & mini cherry pies. I didn't take any pictures of the actual food that day because, you know, getting 2 small children & yourselves ready for a party definitely takes priority!

It was a great week of celebrations with our little man and we have such wonderful memories of the party. Thank you to all of our friends and family for taking the time to come celebrate our Hungry Little Caterpillar, John. He really enjoyed himself (and his cake) and hope you did, too!