Alyson's Birthday Party

Waiting for the guests to arrive - Amy made the banner and the balls hanging from the ceiling.

With Amy!

We were singing Happy Birthday son for Aly.

She blew the candles one by one.

Oh the presents!  Loved all of them.

We had a birthday party for Alyson at home on Saturday and 12 of her friends came over to celebrate.  Amy made beautiful decorations and transformed the living/dining room look like a party palace.   The theme for the party was Hello Kitty and pink!  She is obsessed with Hello Kitty! 

I was going to order a cake at a bakery, but they did not sell Hello Kitty cake.  Since I succeeded with Noah's vanilla carrot cupcakes the night before, I felt good about baking.  I decided to bake my own Hello Kitty cake from scratch.  It took me until midnight on Friday to finish baking and took another hour to decorate it the next day, but the cake turned out pretty decent.  I made a double layered yellow cake filled with whipped cream and fresh strawberries.  I covered the top and sides with whipped cream and used mini chocolate chips to outline Hello Kitty's face.  Her bow was three strawberry slices and used a cut grape for nose.  I didn't want to put too much decorations on the top to keep it simple.  Aly loved the cake and the guests liked them, too!  I might -- try baking the Ironman cake for Sean in a few weeks.

I cannot believe that the twins are four now.  They've grown up a lot, but it just seems like a short while ago they were learning to walk and drooling all over their bibs!  Now, even little Saya isn't so little anymore and I am starting to understand why some people say they would give anything just to go back in time to experience their children's babyhood one more time.  I close my eyes when I kiss them good night and inhale their scent in hope to burn it in my memory.  Bitter sweet, indeed.