March has been so good to us. Hope it was a good month for you too. So here’s ending the month with a few tips and details of our simple 1st birthday celebration for our little girl Chesca.

Yes, she turned one last March 3 and everyone can only say “time flies” or “it’s so fast, she’s so big already”. I cannot get more emotional and dramatic as a first time mom (ergo my letter to my daughter). As parents, we look back on how wonderful the past year has been for both of us as a couple and as parents. It’s not really easy but we have each other so everything is somehow easier and being united as parents is priceless.

Being pregnant halfway through the first year of having my first child is the most challenging one. I got a nanny after my first trimester so everything was physically and emotionally challenging. But our faith and love conquered all those things and now we’re excited to welcome another bundle of joy soon, looks like a very active baby boy to me 😉

Enough of the emotional outburst (hahaha!) and let’s go to the simple celebration for our baby girl’s first birthday.

As individual persons, we have been practical in so many celebrations from our engagement to our honeymoon and now to our first born’s first birthday. The money we save goes to savings for our future needs and at the same time we would like to teach our children the true value and meaning of every celebration over the extravagance and luxuries of the celebrations may bring. I have nothing against the expensive and glamorous parties out there, I respect individual differences and preferences of course 🙂 This is just our personal choice and personal preference to bring up our children. We also put to charity whatever we save from the celebrations as a way to thank God for all the blessings He has given us every single day.

Hope you get some tips on what you can do for some of your celebrations too 🙂

On the Day of the Birthday

On the exact day of our baby’s birthday we prepared a little DIY design on our wall for her at home along with her furry friends, went for thanksgiving mass where we requested the parish to offer an intention for our baby girl’s first birthday during the mass, had late lunch in a mall where we can have a quick stroll as a family, and had dinner out as a family too.

A special day for our little Chesca which I know she will enjoy looking at the pictures and hearing the stories when she’s a bit bigger or when she understands everything already 🙂

The highlights of the day:

Just like how it is in Chili’s when there’s someone celebrating his / her birthday, they sang a jolly happy birthday song for our baby too with free ice cream.

Kimpura’s always a good place for quality Japanese food

Celebration with Family and Friends

Of course, we would also like to share our family’s milestones with our closest friends and family. We decided to have a McDonald’s party !

As practical as we want everything to be, we like the idea of talking to one or just few suppliers. Since this is a kiddie party, why not make it a full kiddie party right? No problems on the venue, party booths, party tables, etc. just family, love, and fun!

We like the idea of thinking about less things for celebrations. I cannot fully do a DIY party  (as originally planned) since pregnancy gave me physical limitations the past months 😉 But good thing I had the energy to do all the DIY stuff I wanted on my own! That’s good enough 🙂 Last minute (as in days before), we added a few elements to the party venue too.

Since our baby’s favorite characters still change from time to time (aside from Minnie and Mickey Mouse as the consistent ones in the lineup), we decided to have a Ronald and the Gang party theme. The branch gave us 3 mascots on the day itself. It was a mascot party!

We also used the invitations provided by McDonald’s and just added the save the date in the advance invite. Of course, we maximized technology and sent e-invites to all. We had 120 guests who arrived on the day of the celebration out of the 150-160 invited. We felt the love from everyone (even those who couldn’t join us)!

We were happy how fun it was for everyone! We’ll have another 1st birthday again next year! how exciting right? We were happy with everything overall. Chesca was awake the while time, interacting with everyone- no tantrums, a bit sleepy towards the end and got overexcited when we got home. We had a lot of savings too which we put into our baby’s bank account 🙂

There were too many photos but here are a few of them from our ever reliable and talented photographer (since the baptism of our little Chesca), Betty Uy:

She’s all set!

We’re four in these family pictures 😉

All personally handcrafted (ceramic figurine was purchased).

Precious, candid moments

Thank you to our family and friends who always never fail to overwhelm us with your presence, greetings, and love. Thank you for the support, advices, and loving guidance 🙂

“To live with purpose, to say the courageous thing, to celebrate the simple gift, to follow your dreams, this is a happy life.”- Wayland Henry

Enjoy Celebrations and spread the love!

~Tina~

Sharing the memorable suppliers and restaurants

• Cupcakes by Sonja (for the Rainbow Fiesta Cake) – Facebook account here
• Chili’s (for the birthday lunch food) – Click here for their website
• Kimpura (for the Teppanyaki dinner) – Click here for their website
• Costa Brava (for the large white marshmallow birthday cake in McDonald’s) – for customized cakes you may contact the owner directly (Judah Liu) +63917-8340815
• Betty Uy – She captured our daughter’s baptism too last year and now her first birthday 🙂 Here’s her site
• Barbie’s Balloons and Party Needs– Facebook account here

I just thought of adding something pink and white to the venue so I contacted them for a few more balloons. Turns out they have packages which can suit your budget. They said yes 2 days before the event, delivered them, and installed the balloons too in the venue. Very friendly and accommodating too!

• McDonald’s C5 Metropoli (for the birthday celebration with family and friends) – Click here for the site.

This branch of McDonald’s (from our experience) was very accommodating and we were happy with their overall service. This is one of the few branches that can accommodate 100 plus guests and up. It can fit 150 guests but might be too tight. The branch also has an accredited photo booth supplier. We got them instantly on that day and we were also happy with their service and got the pictures after the party. We talked to Len and Marlon who are in charge of the parties.