The Vakakes Family: Party Animals: Alex's Third Birthday Party

If I would have asked Alex what kind of party he would have wanted, without a doubt he would have either said Power Rangers or Ninja Turtles, depending on the day. I just couldn't do it. He is only turning three. I know next year he will most certainly have a say so, but this year I wanted to keep it sweet. I found a darling invite on Tiny Prints with farm animals on it that said "Join the Party Animals." We were doing the party at Overton Park, so I felt like this was the perfect invite. We could keep it simple with kid food, the park would be the entertainment, and I even found a cute "photo booth" type idea on pinterest using bales of straw, bandanas, farmer hats, etc. We planned the party for May 17th since his actual birthday would fall just two days before the caboose was set to arrive. The day before was Will's preschool graduation and after it was over we spent the afternoon running lots of errands in preparation. The weather was beautiful and I just knew it would be on Saturday as well. Saturday morning was chilly and overcast....but totally doable. Alex and I set out to pick up the doughnuts since he had requested those instead of cake. It started to rain and I started to pray. It lightened up and then eventually stopped. While it was certainly not an ideal day for a park birthday party, it would work. At 9:15 we pulled into the Publix parking lot to have the balloons blown up. The party started at 10:00. Before I could get out of the car, MONSOON type rain started pelting down. This clearly would not work. We had no idea if this rain would be short lived, but there was no way to get everything set up in this downpour and then all the park equipment would be soaked. John looked at me and said "Don't cry. Who do I need to start calling." We decided that the best thing to do would be just to re-route everyone to our house. In my car we had 48 grilled hot dogs, 48 doughnuts, chips and drinks galore....it couldn't all go to waste! I completely blanked out on who we had invited and needed to get in touch with because all I kept thinking about was the state of our house when we left. I remember laughing as I closed the door to the garage to get in the car and joked to John that we certainly couldn't have the party here if it started to rain....go figure! John was a total rockstar. He helped me remember who we needed to contact and then he made the executive decision to take Will back home with him while Alex and I went into Publix to get the balloons blown up. So they took off to clean up our disaster of a house and Alex and I ran through the rain into Publix. 20 minutes later (at about 9:50) the sun was BRIGHTLY shining and the rain was GONE. I was so incredibly frustrated! It was too late to re-route people BACK to the park and nothing seemed to have gone right with this party! However when I got home, my perspective quickly changed. John and Will had done an amazing job getting the house picked up, all our family and friends were there when we arrived, and Alex could have cared less where his party was. He ran into the backyard where kids were jumping on the bounce house, swinging, and drawing with chalk, and said "YAY!!" Did the party turn out like I wanted it to? Heck no! Those that know me, know I love a good birthday party! I love the planning and details that go into it. We didn't even set up the "photo booth" because there was no room. But no one knew and it didn't matter. I frantically got all the food set up on the table with the help of several and we had a birthday party! I did not want Alex to get slighted on a party just because his little brother was coming two days later, and he didn't. Our family and friends were so precious to be so flexible with us and celebrate our boy! As a side note, I don't know that I will ever plan a birthday party outside again :)
I look ROUGH....but just keep in mind what all had gone on that morning, will you please? :)