Happy 4th Birthday, Elisa!

 I can't believe my sweet little princess is already 4!! For the longest time I wanted, and was planning, a princess party for Elisa.  But I came across a page in Better Homes & Gardens magazine that showcase these beautiful edible butterflies, and I just had to try them out!  So I changed her theme from Princess to Butterfly.  Silly that birthdays even need a theme, I mean, birthday is the theme, right? Anyway, I ordered the edible butterflies off of Etsy.  They were $10, kind of a waste of money, practically speaking, but I couldn't resist!  However, buying these made the cupcake decorating really easy for me. I would need to do was to make some cupcakes and slap the butterflies on.  And that's what I did!
As it turns out, butterfly stuff is reallllly easy to find!  I hit the butterfly jackpot at the dollar store. Elisa enjoyed picking out anything and everything that had a butterfly on it.  She was so excited. We found butterfly crackers, cakes, and I even bought a butterfly cookie cutter to make butterfly sandwiches.  I wanted to keep Elisa's party as simple as possible because I was just too tired and too busy. And poor. I'm glad I bought her a butterfly dress long before I decided on a butterfly theme, it worked out just perfectly.
Elisa wanted to invite all the girls in her preschool.  I wasn't too keen on it but I figured most of them wouldn't come anyway.  We invited all of her dance class girls and a couple other friends.  Only TWO of the 15 or so girls from her preschool game.  Sheesh.  I was actually kinda happy that I was right about most of them not showing up!  I was getting stressed that there would be too many girls at the party.
I'm always running around like a crazy person an hour before the party, cleaning and getting decorations up.  And I always struggle to come up with party games.  We didn't end up doing any.  I chose to do balloon butterflys and glitter tattoos.  I most have forgotten to take a picture of the butterfly twisty balloons I made! Darn! They were cute, but I'm a one-trick pony and those butterfly balloons are the extent of my twisty balloon skills, so I'm kinda bummed I didn't take a picture.  Oh well. The kid loved the butterflys, but unfortunately they would pop on the stiff Texas grass.  And they were also excited about the glitter tattoos.  The kids didn't mind that there were no party games; they just enjoyed playing together.  The adults had a blast making the twisty balloons.  Until the pump broke.  I think everything overall went well.  I was relieved that Ian slept through most of the party preparation and the party itself.
Elisa had so much fun! She loved all of her presents.  And we love Elisa.  She's such a sweet silly girl! I'm glad she loved her little birthday party.              

 Here are some pictures.  I brought the good camera out and then the battery died on me, so all I have are these iPod pictures:

 Jackpot!

 Elisa loves getting her makeup done at JCPenny. This picture was taken after she got her 4-year portraits taken.

 Practicing some twisty-balloon art

 The food! Minus the sandwiches.  Those seemed to be a big hit!

 The presents!

 Some guests.  We borrowed some chairs and tables from the church.

 Elisa's friend, Abby

 The cupcakes!  I wanted to put some sparkle on it, but I had forgotten that I had used my sparkle flakes all up!

 

 

 

 

My sweet Ian-buttfly!