This past Saturday we celebrated Linley’s first year of life with family here at the Asayplacey, and this is how it went down:
The entry welcome banner: 
This is the wall of photo streamers we made to celebrate in-utero through 11 months – ‘Celebrating Linley Louise’ (two nails, twine, linen, tape, photos, card stock, markers, hole punches, needle and thread). It’s difficult to see, but the birdie in the top left was a part of her shower decor before she was born, and the little red sparkly hand print on the left about 5 photos down was made for her when she was just one month old: 
LL’s ‘ONE’ cake:
She thought it was the sweetest thing when we lit the candle and everyone began singing to her:
I made her mini cupcakes of the same cake with a different frosting. I made whipped cream and attempted to dye it with blube juice (juice from heated frozen blueberries). It was working, but it was last minute and I didn’t make enough juice so it was more of a light purply grey. She didn’t know what she was supposed to do at first…
So she said, ‘please?!’ and explored
I wasn’t prepared with a bib, so we took the cardigan off because with nearly each bite she kept signing, ‘please’, smearing cake and cream all over her chest.
*side note: thank you Lindsey Nims of Babble4Baby for making us her sweet bow! She has far more than what is currently listed on the website and makes everything custom!
Then we cleaned up sweet messy hands, everyone else had cake, and LL played with tissue paper and cards (i.e. opened birthday gifts)
reading her cards:
I loved her expression when holding up her new swim halter: 
Whenever I would take a drink from my water bottle, LL would go crazy, so for her day, she received her very own Camelbak bottle:
Another please?
yeah! she got the paper off:
Score!
And what’s opening gifts if you can’t get some help from a couple of cousins:
And then we partied and charlared until the storm (tornados and strong winds came that night!) was closing in and family had to head home.
LL having fun playing with Great Gram Joyce’s purse (she likes mastering zippers):
This is how you clap your hands, Grandpa:
Miss Cori piling all available animals on LL’s lap:
Hey Uncle Z:
This was so sweet. I looked over, and LL was sitting on cousin Mag’s lap hangin out: 
Buddies
mmm fruit and cheese – thanks Grandma A and Great Gram Elaine 
Everyone seemed to really enjoy the balloons: 
Including us after everyone left!
We’ll end with the best and most recent family photo we have to date (pay no mind to the finger prints). Thanks everyone for helping to celebrate LL’s birthday with us! She DEFINITELY had a great time with a full house. 
The Asay Placey 