Noah's 2nd Birthday: Celebration #4

Noah's fourth and last birthday celebration was here in Singapore. As we were typing this post, we just realized that he celebrated his birthday in three countries (France, Switzerland and Singapore)! In Singapore, Noah and his friend Daniel had a joint party at Fidgets, an indoor playground. When it's too hot or too wet to play outside, there's Fidgets: the kids climb the giant slides, and the parents sit in the cafe, watching the kids play and drinking coffee.

There was a room set aside for the party. Being the first to arrive, Noah and Daniel had the blow-up castle that filled the room to themselves in the beginning.

The guests started streaming in and the children quickly took to the castle. Noah's friends Kathryn (Katy as Noah calls her) and Luna playing in the castle.

It was quite a versatile castle, you could jump on it and slide down it and crawl over it...

Audrey started a new trend: balancing on the edge of the castle and walking (or crawling) in circles. Noah demonstrates this maneuver here:

When everyone had arrived, the kids sat down for lunch. Noah and Daniel were crowned joint kings, sitting on the big birthday boy seats.

They all played "pass the parcel." Noah sort of understood the concept...

... and was very excited when the music stopped and he was still holding the parcel.

Next, it was time for birthday cake! Daniel had a beautiful green iggle piggle chocolate cake. Everyone sang happy birthday, and Daniel blew out his candles.

Then it was Noah's turn. The staff brought over his cake, a plane! First everyone sang his favorite song. (Just now when looking at these pictures with us, he began singing "Happy Birthday Noah" yet again.)

He patiently waited until the song was done. Now is it time to blow out the candles?

And then, with a great big breath, half blowing through his nose and half blowing from his mouth....

...the first candle went out...

...and the second candle went out....

... and it was time for the best part: eating the cake! It was full of strawberries, Noah's favorite.

Maman and Daddy came over for a photo opp and some hugs.

After the cake, there was a Thomas the Train pinata. It was a surprisingly resistant pinata, but after much whacking (and with a little bit of help), the pinata opened...

and the scramble for candy began.

The kids then eagerly received their goody bags.  Here's Matthias with his stickers!

After a fun-filled party, Noah and a few of his friends went nextdoor to the main playground for the afterparty. Some sliding...

And of course, lots of hugging (here with Audrey).

All in all Noah very much enjoyed his final birthday celebration and still talks about his plane-shaped cake, his friends, the pinata and of course, the "happy birthday Noah".

Noah's 2nd Birthday: Celebration #3

Noah's good friend and loyal twitter follower Linus was on vacation on July 10th so he could not be there when Noah first celebrated his birthday. Last time Noah and Linus had seen each other, Noah was not even 11 months old and Linus was about 4 months old!

Now (well, in July), Linus is an adorable (and very tall) 17 month old.

On July 18th, Linus (and his maman and papa) invited Noah and their common friend Romy for lunch...

...and a surprise birthday cake. Noah was quite excited at this unexpected opportunity to celebrate his birthday and sing his then favorite song "Happy Birthday to Noah"!

Not to mention the opportunity to have some yummy chocolate cake.

After lunch, the kids played in the backyard with Linus's house. The trio had a grand time together (sometimes playing together and sometimes next to each other).

They also played with little red cars.

Until Noah and Romy tried to hug and kiss Linus. It was great seeing all three together playing. Hopefully we can have another reunion soon.

Linus's maman made a cute photo montage of them playing.  Enjoy!

Noah's 2nd Birthday: Celebration #2

Remember the babygroup? We had met 5 other sets of parents before the birth of our respective children. They were all born within a month of Noah, and we continued meeting up occasionally until we left for Singapore. Here are five of the little ones celebrating their first birthday in June of 2010.

On July 17th 2011, we met up with four of the other five toddlers from the baby group for a second 2nd birthday celebration. The plan was to meet up in a park and have a birthday picnic but unfortunately the weather did not cooperate so we met in a mall cafe instead. Noah did not seem to mind, however. He and his buddies ran around, danced around, ate and sang. We are not sure if he remembered his friends but he definitely took to little Emma.

And enjoyed wearing a birthday hat and blowing whistles.

And of course, opening presents and singing "Happy birthday to Noah".

They have all grown up quite a bit since the first meeting back in the summer of 2009!

Happy belated second birthday to everyone.

Noah's 2nd Birthday: Celebration #1

Noah was a lucky boy: he got to celebrate his second birthday four times. He was really excited for his birthday after watching his friends celebrate theirs. For weeks prior to his birthday, he would wake up every morning and ask, "Happy birthday Noah? Happy birthday to Noah today?" in a hopeful voice.


His first birthday celebration was in Ferney-Voltaire, France at our friend Jacquie's house on July 10, 2011. Before the party even started, Noah already had his first birthday presents to open. He had a great time discovering his new games and toys with his tata NiCole and tonton Charles before they had to go back to the U.S.

That morning amid the sounds of thunder and torrential rain, we joked that Noah would probably need an ark to make it through his birthday. Even so, we started blowing up balloons and more balloons.

Noah's Papy and Mamie had already arrived to help set up and to celebrate with the birthday boy. 

That afternoon, the sun came out in the nick of time, just as the guests were beginning to arrive. There was Miriam, Marco, and Stella (our ex-neighbors from Nyon); there was Celine, Seb, and Romy; and there was Vincent, Klara with their twins Romeo and Zoe. Here are all the kids swinging on the swing.

Before the official birthday goûter, the kids played games out in the yard, running around, sponging water from bucket to bucket and drawing with chalk.

Then, they ate some food. Maman went a bit overboard with the healthy snacks, carrots, celery broccoli and various dips as well as fruit and coulis. Most of the kids were not too interested in the food... except for Noah who LOVES dips and fruit. Then came the birthday cakes. Two fruit tarts!

After a round of happy birthday and some yummy tarts, the kids ran around for a while and played. Noah then opened his gifts. Some great books and games and clothes and... a camera from Papy and Mamie. He was very very excited about the camera and is always asking to take pictures. He even tried to take a picture with the camera wrappings!

Before heading home, we gave each child a card with a color and drawing. The kids had to find the hidden bags and match the color and drawing to figure out whose it was. Within a short time period and to the excitement of the older children, the five bags were found and given to the right child. All in all, it was a great sunny party.

Blogging Noah

After two years of watching Noah tweet, we have been inspired to begin our own blog! As you can tell from the last couple of months, Noah has become too busy to tweet, but we will try to catch up. For those of you who followed Noah on twitter, he has already gone from an adorable little newborn with the hands of a conductor, the pout of his uncle and the growl of a famished wolf:

to an equally adorable walking, talking, counting, laughing, joking, singing two-year-old toddler:

It has been a whirlwind amazing adventure so far! To be continued...