Birthday Bash!

My sweet Monkey Boy turned two this week.  How did the baby that I prayed so long for get so big so fast?  If you've ever met Jonas you understand the nickname.  He's mischievous and silly and sweet and climbs every thing.  Given that, we of course had to go ape for his birthday.

We kept the celebration small.  My kids alternate big party years, and this year was big brother's turn.  But, it still has to be special, right?  Since my little monkey ripped our other birthday banners it gave me a perfect excuse to make one that was more graphic.  Inspired by the banner over at Life in the Fun Lane, I wanted something we could all use.

I started by color copying pages from an old book from my mother's childhood.  Got the aged look without having to tea stain.  Then I used those pages to print the large black letters.  I backed them with card stock circles and sandwiched black crepe paper between them, trimming them down to a more masculine size.  My final trick was that I glued a card stock loop on back so that I could thread them onto ribbon or twine, making them reusable.

Then, of course he needed a birthday hat, so I threw this together:

For dinner, he wanted his two favorites, pancakes and hotdogs. So, of course, that got the monkey treatment too...

Normally, I create a cake in the shape of whatever my kids are into at the time.  But, with the monkey theme, I couldn't resist making these insanely delicious looking Banana Caramel Cupcakes from Bakers Royale.  But, this was a party for a two year old, and that seemed quite sophisticated.  So, I made up a little bunting with a happy little monkey swinging from it, tied it to two skewers and viola!

Guess which one went to the birthday boy.  Birthday was a smashing success as is evidenced here:

I love you Monkey Boy!