The Birthday Party

In what I can only imagine to be a long line of cake-smearing, shrill shrieking, candy-eating chicanery for Megan, we attended her first soiree, Reva Grace Riel's first birthday party. 

As you will see from the pictures that follow, the theme of the day was ducks. There were literally hundreds of these quackers decorating the house. There were ducks on the coffee table, ducks as cakes, ducks in the punch bowl, ducks as pinatas, books, stuffed animals, bath toys, etc. If it was ever made in Taiwan or China and remotely related to ducks, I think Reva got it as a gift.

Megan, who has been fighting a terrible cold and her first tooth, was in remarkably good spirits for most of the day. The party started at 3 and ran till almost 6:30. This is usually her fussy period of the day, so the fact she stayed coherent at all was surprising to us. Although that generally meant one of us was holding her (mostly Jill) for the afternoon.

She was pretty good about the present opening experience, mostly because I don't think she even understood what was going on. A two-year-old friend of Reva's did however, and was more than a bit dismayed that there were an enormous amount of gifts, and none of them for her. I know we'll be fighting that battle down the road, but for now she was content to watch and see what toys came out.

And heck, did I mention the whole family got involved? In the picture above I have on a strangely goofy outfit, complete with Harry Potter-esque socks. That's because part of my gift to Reva was to come to the party like this:

Right after this picture was taken she freaked out. The night before, we didn't get a picture of it, but Megan flipped out too. Something about a six-foot duck that messes with a kid's brain. They can't process it. But I had a great time. And because Megan reacted like she did, it takes me off the hook for dressing up on her birthday in February.