"I'm 4! Hear Me Roar!" Birthday Party

I feel so sad writing this post because things did not go as planned with this party. I was so excited to throw this dinosaur birthday party for my oldest son mainly because it was the first party he had friends he wanted to invite and I was excited about that. It was also the last party we would have with family and friends before moving across the country to Ohio for my husband to start dental school. 

I had everything planned for weeks and invitations sent out when a few days before my youngest got sick. I wasn't too worried about it until I took him to the doctor the day before the birthday party: he had hand, foot, and mouth disease. I literally started crying in the car on the way home because I knew we had to cancel the party. It was gonna be such a fun way to celebrate our son and say goodbye to family and friends and now we wouldn't be able to do that.

I decided I would still decorate the house and do some of the games with just my boys. We still had a great time and it's a good thing we canceled because later that afternoon my oldest started to not feel good and by the end of the night he was super sick. It was a bummer how it all turned out, but my kids know they're still loved and we can try again maybe next year!

I found these super cute invitations on Etsy and I edited them to fit our party needs. Just like we did with my son's train birthday party, we asked that people give snacks, experiences, or gift cards because we were moving and didn't have room for more toys.

These decorations were seriously so much fun to buy and set up! From Etsy to Target and Amazon to the Dollar Store, I think we had more than enough to show our dinosaur theme!

My mom, being the super fun and amazing grandma she is, borrowed a dinosaur to chase the boys around. Even though they weren't feeling well, they squealed and ran and loved the grandma-saurus!

I had planned a few games and activities for all the kids to play and decided to still do a few of them for my boys. I had them decorate paleontologist hats with stickers, crack open dinosaur eggs, and do a dinosaur scavenger hunt. We really still had a blast despite the circumstances.

A few months before my son turned 4 he had asked his aunt (my amazing sister-in-law @lunacakesco) to make him an epic dinosaur cake. He wanted a volcano with lava and smoke and dinosaurs, emphasizing that he wanted it to be "massive!". 

Well, when I found out we were gonna have to cancel the party, I called her immediately, crying, saying how bad I felt she had gone to all the work to make him his cake. She responded with a "Don't even worry! Will asked for a cake and I have filled his order! I will be dropping it off as planned!" She truly is amazing! She dropped his cake off and he couldn't even handle it! He was sooo excited! The coolest part was that she made the volcano erupt with dry ice smoke! It was seriously impressive and totally made his day. We definitely had cake for days, but it was worth it to see him so happy.

The plan was to give these cute dinosaurs I had found at the dollar store as party favors. I typed up the little thank you tag and even made little party hats for all the dinosaurs. Will ended up giving them to all of his cousins the next time we saw everyone.

Things definitely didn't go how I thought they would and I was pretty devastated because of it, but I'm glad no one else got sick and that we still got to celebrate the cutest four-year-old around! Maybe we'll try another dinosaur party a different year:)