Early birthday party planning :)

We now have an eight month old as of last Saturday. Whattt?! Where has the time gone?

This time last year I was barely beginning to show as I freaked over weight gain and lathered myself constantly with cocoa butter. My how things change.

Constance is growing so quickly! She is on the brink of crawling! I think she really just likes to move backward and in a circle, because it's more comfortable that way. She'll figure it out though. I was freaking out about her not crawling yet, but I know different babies move at different paces. She seems to be right on track with everything else, so I am not really concerned.

She really needs to get updated on her shots, but it's been such a pain to set aside money for gas to get to her pediatrician. Her doctor is about 45 minutes away from here and although it didn't seem long at first, now it just seems like another world away. I love her doctor and I would really hate to switch, so I guess we're just going to have to figure things out and see. But her stats will be up as soon as she goes! :)

I am also in the early stages of planning her first birthday party. Aaaah! I have never planned a birthday party for a little kid before, so this is kind of scary. I want to make sure all of the other kids have fun and make sure it's a good memory for all of us. And we need to plan alongside our budget.

I'm thinking we're going to do something like a cookout, since her birthday will be in late September and it will still be warm out. So outdoor activities are what I'll be looking into. :)

No worries about the money side of it right now, though or I'll just start worrying about a bunch of other things.

I have picked a theme and I am super excited about it!

If you know my sweet Constance, it will not come as any surprise to you!

 Monkeys! She absolutely loves her Monkey, so I figured that would be the best theme to go with. Now I just need to find an affordable Monkey set of plates, napkins, cups, etc. to go with. I'll probably make the invitations myself. :)

This is kind of exciting, but like I said ... kinda scary! But this new venture of party planning might be kind of fun for me. We'll see!

Soo ... any ideas? How did you do your baby's first birthday party? What kind of fun things did you to do entertain the other kids? Or the parents?

All ideas are welcome!