Books, babies and bows.

Some of Livi’s favorite things 🙂

It was an amazing day to celebrate an amazing little girl. Lots of “Happy Birthday” singing in the morning, breakfast together and then after her first nap, we headed to the zoo. The weather was gorgeous and nana joined us for our adventure.

Zoo

We had a blast walking around- Liv blew kisses to all of the animals and practiced her animal sounds.

With dolly

Lunch, back home, and during her afternoon nap, I started to get things ready for a little family get-together at our house.

Making cake  1 of 1

Her party is at the end of the month, but I wanted to invite her grandparents and my bros (+ Meg and Mich!) to come enjoy cake and dinner with us on her actual birth date.

The decor was simple- some pink streamers and a birthday banner

Birthday sign  1 of 1

(purchased on Etsy from this lovely vendor– she did a beautiful job!)

and so was the food:

Pizza and salad  1 of 1

Pizza! Since Liv first tried and loved pizza last week, it was an easy choice for dinner for a crowd. I made a salad with greens, goat cheese, almonds, dried cranberries and homemade balsamic dressing, set out chips + dip, and ordered 4 jumbo thin crust pizzas from Rosati’s. Mom brought a party pack of eegee’s (thank you again, madre!) and we had beer, sparkling water…

and cake 🙂

Cupcakes and smash  1 of 1

Vanilla cake with buttercream frosting 🙂

For the purple, I used the same purple carrot extract I had picked up for our lava bottles. It wasn’t quite as vibrant as I’d hoped, but since I had it on hand and it enabled me to avoid artificial coloring, I rolled with it.

The best:

The cake  1 of 1 4

The cake  1 of 1 11

After cake, we all spent the evening chatting,

Girls table  1 of 1

(the girls’ table)

playing Family Feud and watched Liv open gifts.

Birthday girl  1 of 1 5

My friend Cristin is expecting a little girl in the spring, so I was so excited to lend her my Snoogle for the rest of her pregnancy.

Cristin  1 of 1 I also loved rubbing her belly and talking to my little cousin in there. I’ve officially turned into a creepy belly-rubber (with permission of course, haha).

It really was the perfect way to celebrate. I’m so excited to share all of the photos with Liv when she’s older -my family passed the camera around throughout the night, snapping photos as the evening went on- and to be able to show her that since she’s been born, she’s been surrounded by so many people who love her.

Cheeringfam

(the labor and delivery cheering squad)

Thank you so much to all of you for her birthday wishes, too <3 We appreciate your kind words, beautiful comments and tweets more than you know.

The fam  1 of 1 2

Have a wonderful day and I’ll see you later on the Fashion page!

xoxo,

Gina

What’s the first birthday party you actually remember? The first one I vividly remember was my kindergarten joint birthday party, with my best friend Hayley. We had a 50s theme and spent the entire party dancing around to 50s music.

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75 Comments

  1. Ali @ WHOLEistically Fit on January 10, 2013 at 11:24 am

    Aw, happy birthday little Liv! The cake you made was gorgeous. I love that Liv blew kisses to all the animals at the zoo – what a sweetheart. 😀

    (By the way, just so you know, when I commented, there was information for someone else in the name and email field. Not sure if others are experiencing this as well, but I just thought I’d let you know.)

    • Fitnessista on January 10, 2013 at 11:35 am

      that’s been happening since they did a server upgrade last week. nothing has been resolved yet :/ sorry for the weirdness and inconvenience!

  2. Carrie R. on January 10, 2013 at 12:23 pm

    HAPPY HAPPY BIRTHDAY to the Princess!!! What a beautiful birthday girl!!!

    I loooove the picture of her turning to her Mommy holding the cake. Those cheeks are ah-mazing.

    Best wishes for Liv for a wonderful year!!! 😀

  3. Anna @ The Guiltless Life on January 10, 2013 at 12:45 pm

    Happy birthday to Liv! I was wondering how you celebrate first birthdays because they’re obviously very special – it’s the first after all! – but 1-year-olds have short attention spans and can get overwhelmed so easily. My niece’s will be coming up next summer, so I have been wondering how to do it. Looks like the perfect celebration!

  4. Erin @ Girl Gone Veggie on January 10, 2013 at 4:42 pm

    What a wonderful celebration! The etsy banner is adorable! I love the picture of the three of you at the end, such a beautiful family!

    • Fitnessista on January 10, 2013 at 4:47 pm

      thank you!

  5. Bek @ Crave on January 11, 2013 at 3:08 am

    A 50’s theme when you were five? Haha weren’t you very mature 😛 I remember my 5th birthday at mcdonalds and from then on- I don’t think I remember any earlier. That cake you made her is absolutely adorable! Everything looks great 🙂 Can’t wait to read the recap and see the photos from her big bday bash!

  6. Claire @ Keeping Up With Claire on January 11, 2013 at 12:43 pm

    SHE IS THE CUTEST! You guys are such a beautiful family. Happy birthday to Livi!

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