Happy 1st Birthday Max!!!!!

Max's first birthday was last Friday, October 9th. All week I was really sad that my baby was already one year old - there were even a few tears. But then on the day, I was nothing but happy. It is so amazing to see how he has grown in his first year, and I treasure every moment of it. I feel like the luckiest woman alive to have such a wonderful little boy (and I'm sure all of you moms understand this indescribable feeling).

On Max's actual birthday, we celebrated by going out to dinner at PizzaCake - Max had a Margherita pizza; and then out for gelati - Max had caramel :) Me & Max before dinner

The whole family :)


Waiting for our pizzas


Max after tasting his caramel gelati (it was his first ice cream!)

All of us at the Gelatissimo!

After our big night out, we put Max to bed and got straight to work on making his birthday cake. Luckily, I had the help of Colin and Jean (I couldn't have done it without them!) and I actually started baking the cake(s) that morning. Max's birthday cake was a wombat, my favorite Australian animal. It was part of the Australian Animal theme for his party. The wombat was actually made up of 4 separate cakes that I baked in various shape/sized pans.

The finished product (we finished at 12:15 am!)


For those of you who have never seen a wombat, here is a picture of a real one :)

a quick pic before we put the food out and guests arrived

the adorable Australian animal banner that Jean made :)

in addition to the wombat cake, we also made koala and echidna cupcakes

and Max needed his own cake to tear into...

I think he likes chocolate even better than the white cake he had in Hawaii!

and this time, he's even sharing :)

The party was lots of fun and Max was lucky to have so many friends and family to help him celebrate. We had 7 of Max's kiddie friends, 5 little cousins and 21 grown-ups. It was a lunchtime party, and we set up a little play area for the kids, complete with crash mats and a ball pit. After lunch the bigger kids had fun smashing the pinata and then everyone enjoyed eating the chocolate wombat, koalas and echidnas :)

Macey, Eli and Lily

Macey, Max, Lilly and Reese

(Back) Terry, Indy, Riley, Joe, Martin; (front) Lily and Oli

Max loved watching the big kids hit the pinata at his friend Lily's birthday party (he was laughing so hard, everyone stopped to watch him), so we had to get one for his. He liked hitting the pinata himself almost as much...

And he enjoyed heckling the other kids as they tried to break the pinata open (watch Max as Charlotte hits the pinata)...



I couldn't resist posting this picture...

wombat in the fridge :)

After everyone left, and Max had a (very short - too hyped up on chocolate cake) nap, he and Daddy enjoyed a little game of rugby in the back yard.

At the end of the day, Max was a very tired little one-year old :)