Emily's 5th Birthday Party

I decided I wanted to do something a little bit different for Emily's 5th birthday party.  I feel like turning 5 is a big milestone, so I wanted to do something kind of special that we aren't able to do every year.  So we decided to have her birthday party at the church and rent a bounce house for the kids.  She was super excited!!  

I'm not one of those mom's who starts planning my kids parties months in advance.  I do have a Pinterest account, but I spend a total of about 5 minutes on it at a time, just long enough to get a craft for our preschool choir.  I'm not a very creative person, and I don't really enjoy trying to be.  It stresses me out. But I LOVE to celebrate birthdays!  I want to make my loved ones feel special and let them know how thankful I am for them!  I have more of a last-minute approach when it comes to planning parties.  I didn't make a menu, buy the food, or buy any decorations until the day before.  Since we decided to have this party at the church I did have to reserve the fellowship hall and the bounce house weeks in advance, so someone should pat me on the back for at least doing those things so early.:)  This style can make for a stressful day-before-the-party, so I wouldn't recommend it, but it is what I seem to do every time.  Oh well.  Thankfully this time Nea was in town and was a HUGE help in getting everything ready.  

We took a Watts family picture before all Emily's friends started arriving!  

This is a picture of the bounce house that we rented for her party.  I forgot to get a full picture of the bounce house at Em's party, so this was the same bounce house at a different event that the company had sent me when I was booking it.  

They dropped the bounce house off about 2 1/2 hours before her party so we made sure we were super organized that morning so that we could get up to the church early and let the kids bounce for awhile before all their friends got there.  

This was one of my favorite times of the whole day, when all five of us were in the bounce house together.  I love these people.  We had fun!! 

Party decorations....

We let the kids jump for awhile while everyone was arriving.  It was a little tricky to enforce only having 7 or 8 kids in there at a time.  Thankfully, that wasn't one of my jobs.:)  

After they had jumped for awhile we brought them in for a couple games.  Emily loves obstacle courses and she had asked Bert a couple months ago if he would set one up for her party. The kids all loved it!

After the games it was time to sing and cut the cake!  She was about to burst from smiling so big when all her friends were singing to her.  

Goodness we love this sweet girl.  

After filling up our tummies it was time for Emily to open some presents.  Some of the kids headed back out to jump and some stayed inside while she opened.  

Grandmama and Pawpaw drove up from Jackson that morning.  They had to leave at 6:30am, but they wouldn't have missed her party!  We were so glad they could be there!  

Renea got lots of Ressie snuggle time while all the party craziness was going on.  Ressie just slept right through most of it.  Sweet thing.  

One person had to be on "Claire duty" the entire time.  We left the doors to the outside open so the kids could go in and out easily, but that meant Claire would try to make a run for it too!:)  Papa was happily on "Claire duty" for a lot of the party!

After all the kids left Papa got in the bounce house to jump with Em!  

After we finished cleaning up we headed back to our house to let the kids play outside for a little bit before the Sanders Clan had to head back to Toccoa.  Emily took Jacob for a spin in her red car.  Jacob has a blue jeep of his own and he pretty much lived in that thing last summer.  He loves his blue jeep and is a really good driver.  Emily is still a really cautious (slow) driver and I don't think she was going quite fast enough for Jacob.  Ha!  Jacob was really sweet about it but when Emily got out he took the car for a spin himself and put the pedal to the metal (which really isn't very fast), but he was definitely drove it in the speed above where Emmy was driving.  

Sweet things.  

Nea, Katherine, me and Claire

Sweet Ressie was happy in Mimi's arms while she was watching her big brother drive the red car around.  

I walked into the living room (just before the Sanders left) this was my view.  I love all the people in this room so much, so I wanted to snap a quick picture and remember the day. Everyone was doing their own thing and it made me smile. 

Thanks to Emily for having a birthday so that we could have such a fun day celebrating and being together.  We all love you, Emmy Lou!!