Grace's 5th Birthday Party

Saturday was Grace's 5th birthday party. She has been looking forward to her "5 years birthday" for a looooong time. It's the first party she's gotten to have with friends. We had it here in the backyard with lots of water to keep cool in this 100 degree heat.

The night before we started getting ready.

 

 Grace helped bake the cake, make the frosting and lick the beaters.

 Rob did an ultra-amazing job decorating. Don't you just feel like you're under the sea in our dining room?

 I decorated my first cake that wasn't a complete disaster! It helps that I just stuck the plastic Ariel and friends on :). The trick is not just dirty icing the cake, but refrigerating it after dirty icing it so it gets hard.

 We had buckets of water balloons and squirt guns at the ready.

We may have had to bust the extra frosting out a few times to cover the tracks of little fingers that just couldn't keep themselves off of the cake.

 

 We got all tatted-up under-the-sea style.

 Benji looked fresh in his shark duds.

 Look at that big standing studmuffin of a baby!

Rob decorated from the front door all the way to the backyard. He's pretty much the best dad EVER!

 We started off playing Pin the Tail on the Whale that I made.

After each activity the kids got gold doubloons for participating.

Next was a water balloon relay that turned into a free-for-all that I might have instigated against Rob :)

Next we played water gun freeze tag.

 And again, Rob looked a little overheated, so I suggested that the kids help him cool off :)

The whole crew

 Grace loved getting to open presents from her friends and was very sweet and let Ruby help her.

Finally everyone got to take a swing (or 9) at the mermaid pinata. She was hard to break!

 The girlies.

Happy Birthday Gracers!