the boy who played with fire!

Canyon turned 2 on Feb 1st. I knew we would have Nanna and Aunt Liz with us here and I knew it would be fun to celebrate so I brainstormed different themes and party ideas during the month of January.

Unfortunately I never settled on anything. I got busy, and lacked enthusaism, and even got a little sick. Any plans of having a bunch of guests and other 2 year olds were quickly fading. I reluctantly decided against having a group over for a party, but still wanted to celebrate for Canyon (and for Asher and Ivy who were equally excited about his birthday). We couldn't quite settle on a theme, Canyon loves dogs so we considered a puppy party, or a ball themed party, or just make a cake and let him blow out the candles because that's really what will give him the most excitement. The kid LOVES to blow out candles and LOVES fire.

and then it hit me/us. A FIRE PARTY! We decided in the morning and by dinnertime we had a pretty sweet FIRE party thrown together.

A candlelit dinner of lasagna and salad.

Birthday banner and balloons (red, orange and yellow of course).

All the candles and tea lights we could find around the house. (scented candles, floating candles, tea lights, emergency candles and menorah candles)

A red velvet cake made by Liz and creatively carved and frosted by Nanna

And just when I was feeling bad that I didn't have any presents for him (poor 3rd child), I remembered that I bought a cute wood vehicle from Pottery Barn's after Christmas sale and it just so happened, it was a fire truck!

We played a few games:

Fire extinguisher (using squirt bottles and candles each participant used water to extinguish their candle's flame from a distance)

hot potato (with a football)

and I spy (always a hit)

It was such a fun night and amazing to me how a little extra effort and prep work made Canyon's birthday just as fun and special as if we planned and prepped for weeks and invited lots of guests.

Canyon was especially cute. He really loved blowing out the candles (multiple times and places) which didn't surprise us. He was especially cute that he knew to wait til the end of the birthday song and he loved every second of being sang to. He really recognized it was his birthday. The birthday was made especially fun with far away family here to play. Hopefully it's not the only birthday he gets to share with far away relatives.