happy valentine's day, kids!

Aidan has been talking a LOT lately about parties... when we are at the store, he holds up cake mix, plastic plates, balloons, etc and says, "For my party?" Sure, sure, for your party, sweetheart.
But, since his birthday is not until late fall, we thought it would be nice to have a little Valentine's party and have some kids over. I met some other moms on post, and invited three kids over on the 10th to make cookies. We bought balloons, which Aidan was totally excited about, and all of the prerequisite heart-emblazoned cups, napkins, plates, and table cloths. It was a little crazy, and I made some mental notes about what would help for the next time, but here is a picture to show it was an overall success:

I tried to have the kids make heart-shaped cookies with the cookie cutters, but I made chocolate chip cookie dough, not sugar cookie dough, which apparently is an issue. They ended up just making balls with spoons, and dousing them in sprinkles.
If the true mark of a successful children's party is how much the kids cry when it's over, well, this was the best party ever. It took us about an hour and a pizza dinner to cheer Aidan up after the kids left- a small price to pay to make him happy.