Hellobee

Since I get a little intense when it comes to first birthdays, I thought it might be interesting to create a “La Fête” series where I blog about the process of party planning. I opt to have pretty parties, but I want to debunk that it reflects a high budget! The first part of the series will cover choosing a theme.

What’s a theme?

People tend to get confused with the word theme. A theme doesn’t always have to be something concrete like animals or cars, but if you like a combination of colors or patterns, that too can be a theme; it’s simply a little more abstract. A theme is what you want it to be. You can find inspiration from the littlest thing and make it great.

When I started thinking about Sienna’s first birthday, I knew I wanted a specific color – emerald. Being the design geek that I am, when emerald was announced to be the Pantone color of the year for 2013, I knew it was perfect since it is May’s birthstone. Then I went into brainstorming overload — that’s the most important part.

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It’s been a rough few days. Nothing serious but I feel like a hormonal mess. Do you remember the days when you only had to care for yourself? When if you needed to take a weekend to wallow, that was perfectly acceptable? I’m not so much complaining as I am making an observation; in fact, I love that this kid keeps me in check. I’m less likely to fall into habits like, say, eating ice cream for breakfast, because I’m striving to model good eating habits.

Of course, that doesn’t mean we don’t get treats…

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Here are the posts that got the most comments, hearts, pins and views this week!

- My Non-Uniform Uniform by Mrs. Cowgirl
- A Day in the Life with 8 Week Old Twins by Mrs. Blue
- Goo Sensory Bags by Amy Christie
- How Long Did It Take You to Conceive? by Swarm
- Taking it Ounce by Ounce by Mrs. Sketchbook
- Traveling with an Infant – Helpful Tips by Mrs. Markers
- Raising a Child with Autism – Part 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 by mamapink
- Chocolate Cinnamon Cookies by Mrs. Twine
- Finding Time When There’s No Time by Mrs. High Heels

For as long as I can remember, Drake has had a love affair with the alphabet which still continues to this day.  I don’t remember when it was that he really started to pay attention to them, but a quick check back on my Facebook posts shows that a few months before 2 years of age he was able to recognize a little more than half the alphabet letters.  Nowadays he has started to move past just saying letters, but also trying to learn to put them together; he can spell a small handful of 3-4 letter words as well as write all 26 letters.  Though I never formally encouraged any of this, I did realize that because of his great love of letters we seem to have quite a lot of toys and books all dealing with the alphabet, so I thought I’d share Drake’s favorite letter toys and books with all of you.

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During R + M’s first year, we didn’t venture out of the house very often. I struggled with getting two kids in the car, assembling the bulky double stroller and schlepping around countless bottles/burp clothes/baby gear/etc. It was easier to stay at home and utilize the endless array of toys/contraptions/tv to keep the kids entertained. I feel guilty even admitting that to you. My family used to joke that taking the kids outside of our neighborhood probably felt like an international trip for them. But then again, none of them have twins.

I never took them to the grocery store. They never went to Target with me. Trips to the park were fewer and farther in between than friends with one baby. We stayed close to home because that made life easier. And I would have done anything to make life easier. We did take a mommy and me class and a music class. But I rarely went to them by myself, and someone always came to help.

One of the rare dual shopping trips we took in the first year

I kept track of 90% of baby-related expenses for the first year of J’s life. I remember reading some similar posts on this and found it so intriguing to see costs among different families who live in different regions, work in different industries, etc. I would deem us as a fairly frugal family and I think what we spent on our son for his first year is probably a little less than the average American family; however I was a stay-at-home-mom until he turned a year old so we had no childcare costs and that helped tremendously. We also had very generous friends and family who gifted us about 60% of our baby registry and were blessed to only spend less than $500 for remaining baby gear and necessities. In addition I was able to nurse exclusively, so there were no formula costs and we didn’t take a hit to our food budget until he was about 9 months old and eating a considerable amount of solids.

I think sometimes the numbers that are out there seem daunting, but in my experience you spend what you have to and there are a lot of frills added into those numbers that may not be necessary. I know I definitely bought J a lot of clothes that were “unnecessary” because he technically had enough clothes, but I couldn’t help but buy stylish duds and pad his wardrobe especially during clearance sales.

Here is my baby budget breakdown for the first year:

Cloth Diaper Stash: $500, then an additional $280 when the first two systems didn’t work for J. Then we sold all the diapers and recouped $500 and put that toward J’s birthday party.

Disposable diapers: $350

Arms Reach Co-Sleeper:$160 + $15 organic sheet

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Burt’s Bees Baby has a sale on Gilt starting at noon EST today featuring their gift baskets at greatly reduced prices!

We also have a great giveaway today from Burt’s Bees Baby! You’re probably already familiar with their famous lip balm and their all natural line of bath products. As a lip balm addict, I’ve personally been using their lip balm for at least a decade… maybe two! Recently they also launched a luxurious 100% organic clothing line with the sweetest clothes and accessories for your little one. And today we’re giving away a big gift basket filled with their bath products, towels, clothes and more valued at over $150!

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