The Mallorys in San Diego: Happy 1st Birthday Susannah!!!

We celebrated Susannah's first birthday this weekend. While we were sad that no family could be here, we felt blessed to have so many new friends to celebrate with.

Here is the invite.

And the balloons.

We had the party favors and the cake on the dining room table, along with the "time capsule." We asked everybody to bring something to contribute and asked our families to send notes or pictures and we plan to seal it up to be opened on Susannah's 18th birthday.

Everybody brought some of the neatest stuff.....newspapers, magazines, receipts, money, a fashion collage, even one of this year's award winning children's books. I'm already looking forward to watching her open it.

My friend Leeanne made the cake. Beautiful, isn't it?

She even made Susannah's little cake with healthy(er) ingredients.

The party was in the backyard and the kids had so much fun playing together.

Here Susannah is showing some of her favorite toys to Adam and Leyton.

Here are all the little girls on the blanket together.

Who are all these people playing with my toys Daddy?

My friends? Okay.

It was fun for the adults to watch all the kids play together.

Here are some of the "big" kids playing ball.

The girls liked playing ball just as much as the boys. Especially a pink ball!

And Susannah shared her new trike.....after she had a turn, of course.

Susannah's swing was a big hit too. This is Zane in his party hat pushing sweet Addison.

Of course, Leyton is still Susannah's best friend.

The adults at the party had fun too. Here are three of my new friends from bible study. Before we moved here, I prayed for Christian friends and Kim, Amber, and Anna are my answer!

We had a photo booth set up with props. Here are our sweet neighbors trying to get the "perfect" Christmas card photo.

Kim and Kenny and Addison

Shannon, Ryan, and Leyton

Amber, Jason, Zane, and Zoe

I think the photo booth was a much bigger hit with the adults than the kids.

The Mallory's were too busy hosting to take a silly picture. We saved all the props though, so maybe at Susannah's second birthday we can snag a crazy shot.

We had some yummy food and drink including a cheese platter, veggies with dips, and chips with salsa and guacomole.

We even used our fire pit for the first time to roast some smores. Yes, we had smores in addition to birthday cake. And it was awesome. Notice I have one in my hand here. Yum is all I can say.

As the sun started to go down, it was cake time!

Little Addison was so excited about the cake, she stuck her finger in for a taste while we were all singing to Susannah. This is her enjoying her piece after she recovered from her embarrassment when her mom yelled, " ADDY NO!" in the middle of "Happy Birthday." She was so embarrassed and upset, but I think this cake and ice cream did the trick in making it all better. So funny!

Here is everybody watching Susannah blow out her candles after the near disaster with Addy and the cake.

"Happy Birthday to you!"

"Happy Birthday dear Susannah! Happy Birthday to you!"

Susannah didn't know what to do with her special cake. She started by sticking one finger into the icing.

"Are you sure this is okay Mommy?"

After we buttoned her bib I think she realized that it was okay to dig in with the full hand.

Eventually she tried her luck with a spoon.

But then decided that the hands were the best utensils after all.

Or maybe the spoon is better......

After 10 minutes or so of playtime with the cake, Susannah decided that she was tired of being sticky and ready to get out of the high chair and play some more.

Here are Anna and Avery enjoying their cake.

After we said good-bye to the last guest, we came inside so Susannah could top her cake off with a little dinner. Here she is posing with all of her presents.