The Sharp Family Update: Birthday Party

Saturday night we celebrated Charles's first birthday. There were 29 people in our house, with six being children 4 and under. There were three little girls all almost 2 years old--Elena in September, Hannah in October, and Merrill in November.

It was a good time with family and friends. We were lucky to have Russell's two sisters, niece, nephew, parents, and Grandpa travel from Texas to celebrate and, of course the extended family here and in Oklahoma were here too.

We had dinner--sloppy joes and hot dogs, and

enjoyed a HUGE cake. Mom has a large pan and it took 3 cake mixes to fill it. It was white cake with butter cream frosting, so of course we didn't have much left over. I know that's my family's favorite Russ's mom's too.

Charles got lots of presents, all of them were a hit. Some of them will ALL the kids. Russell and I got him the Fisher Price Drop and Roll Arounds Dinosaur. I found it at the consignment shop in brand new condition for 1/2 of what it cost brand new! The great part was that I let him play with it before I bought it so I knew it would be a hit. What I didn't know is that all the kids at the party would love playing with it too. Charles got a bubble blowing machine and all the kids went on the deck to play with it. The 2 year-old trio had to take turns blowing bubbles. That was difficult at first, but they each had several turns and had fun making bubbles. Charles wasn't too interested in the bubbles and decided playing in the flower pot and eating dirt was more entertaining. I guess that's the difference between boys and girls.

Charles was in good spirits at the party and even dug into his cake. Aunt Christy got some great pictures. He woke up at 11pm crying and when I went into his room noticed he was having trouble breathing. It was croup, so we turned our bathroom into a steam room. I called Mom & Dad because I knew my brother had croup when we were on a trip to Tulsa. They snuck in the garage door to check on us. Luckily they were out late playing bridge and not in bed, in fact they weren't even home yet.

Russell was in the bathroom with Charles while I read about croup in the What to Expect the First Year book and called Mom & Dad. Our bathroom is so small that it made a great steam room. After 30-45 minutes in the room both those two were drenched. Charles was breathing normally again and we put him in the portable crib in our room. He woke up again at 2am so he got in bed with us. We didn't think he needed to be in the nursery Sunday morning so we had a lazy day at home. He was still not feeling normal but did start walking across the living room. He will be running in a few days.

Now for some pictures: