Twin Birthday 2012: Party for 3-Year-Olds with a Guest Appearance by Leaves

I strolled the aisles of Party City hoping to come up with a new theme for this year’s birthday party for James and Julia, but in the end I decided to give ‘em what they want. And what I knew they would want was more Sesame Street, since James and Julia love Cookie Monster. (James even does a mean impression.) So I basically rehashed the same birthday party for the twins this year as last year, even with the same mylar Elmo balloon. (They still loved the balloon and were quick to give it a nice pummelling.)

Hugs and kisses quickly turn to violence.

Sharon and her nanny Poonim brought Zachary and Zoe, Rachel brought Oliver, Stacy brought Ronan, and new neighbor Beth brought Laura. 

Zachary

Zoe

Oliver

Ronan

Laura

And of course the 3-year-olds of the (2) hour(s):

Sweet Girl

Sweet Boy

First everyone played with toys.

James, Julia, and FrogBoy, er... Ronan play with trains.

Holy crap! She’s going to kill me in my sleep!

Beth holds Laura who tries to take Elmo down.

Pile on Mommy!

Sharon with her twins Zoe and Zachary, and Rachel with Oliver

Stacy with Ronan

It's like the scene in Lady and the Tramp with the spaghetti.

Rachel reads to Oliver.

Ronan decorates Laura’s dress with stickers.

I provided Sesame Street crazy straws and tattoos. Zachary and Zoe have been tattooed at home many a time, so they decided to add a lot of new body art to their tummies.

James and Ronan play with their crazy straws.

"Hey baby, come here often?"

"Hitting on me when his girlfriend is in the room. As if!"

"Things are NOT like this in Minnesota!"

Zoe has a spectator while Poonim gives her a tattoo.

Ernie body art is all the rage these days.

Zachary is pretty tatted up.

Next the kids played Pin the Nose on the Elmo. This seemed like a great idea when I bought it at the store. But the reality was that 3-year-olds don’t take kindly to being blindfolded. After trying a few times and giving up on the blindfolds, the kids ended up being spun around while holding an Elmo nose and simply putting the nose exactly on top of the real nose. Not surprisingly, we ended up with about 6 Elmo nose stickers on top of each other. 

James gives Elmo some water.

I cover James’s eyes with my hand since he’s unwilling to wear a blindfold. He’s the first and last to go along with having his eyes even remotely covered.

I pointlessly turn Julia in a circle before letting her pin the nose on Elmo.

What do you know? She got the nose exactly in the right place!

Wow! Zoe did it too!

Playing "Pin the Nose on the Elmo" is pretty easy when the kids refuse to wear blindfolds. Or so one would think.

We sang the birthday song, once for each birthday girl and boy, and then chowed down on cupcakes. (They were the same Whole Foods mini cupcakes as last year, but if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.) In a retread of last year’s party, James inhaled his, while Julia preferred to contemplate hers. And furthering the parallel to last year’s festivities, Ronan even sauntered by, sat down next to Julia, and noticed her uneaten cupcake. Stacy and I devilishly encouraged Ronan to pilfer her cupcake for a photo op, but Ronan didn’t take the bait.

James blows out his candle.

"I bet I can eat it in one bite."

"I guess it will be two."

Meanwhile, Julia prefers to keep her cupcake around for display purposes only.

Ronan can't resist the siren song of an uneaten cupcake.

Despite what appears to be photographic evidence to the contrary, I’m not sure she actually ever took a bite.

Zoe likes her cupcake.

Our front yard is a fall leaf paradise for exactly two weeks of the year, right around the twins’ birthday, and the kids ran around outside in the leaves. Beth, our temporary Minnesota transplant marvelled that our kids were playing in fall foliage... in December... in 70 degrees.

Thanks to Stacy for so many pictures!