Isabella's Birthday Week Day 4 (Party Day!)

I'm not going to lie and say I wasn't nervous the entire weekend. I've never hosted a "Passover" anything, much less a party with FOOD. With the help of some delicious family recipes, Mom's kosher-for-passover lemon bars, Faye's kosher-for-passover brownies and flourless cupcakes from Sprinkles, I believe I actually pulled off a rather tasty party - all things considered.

After running errands all morning (picking up cupcakes, balloons, additional party favors, etc...), by the time I got home, I had exactly 1 hour and 15 minutes to finish assembling the party favors, set out the food trays, shower and get ready. Fortunately, Faye, Grandma and Grandpa stepped in to put together the favors (and they did a great job). Mom pitched in to help put out the food and that left me free to get ready. Isabella was sweet enough to take a nice long afternoon nap, so she slept through the entire thing. She woke up after her party had already started. I rushed to get her dressed and attempted to change her earrings for the first time since getting them pierced 2 months ago. It took 5 different people and lots of peroxide and Aquafor to get the job done. She was screaming bloody murder. It's not because she was in pain, it was because she hates being restrained. With tears streaming down her face (but really pretty earrings in her ears), she entered her party to see all of her friends. For someone who LOVES crowds as much as Isabella, it took her an awfully long time to loosen up. This was due in part to her having just woken up and partly because there were 50 people to adjust to. She wanted me to hold her for the first 45 minutes. Once we sat her down to sing Happy Birthday and give her a cupcake, she was fine.

If you recall, on her actual birthday she was totally disinterested in her "leavened" cupcake and hardly had two bites. Today was a completely different story. The child prefers chocolate; what can I say? She devoured the "unleavened" cupcake (a delicious dark chocolate flourless cupcake). I had to take away half of it so she wouldn't make herself sick. It was so cute. She loved every minute of that.