Birthdays

Dude turned eight today. Yeah! He's so excited about his upcoming baptism. For the past month he's been counting down the days to his birthday and his party. We have told the kids they can have parties when they turn 8, 12, and 16 since those are big milestone birthdays to us. So tonight we did the big party for Dude at Incredible Pizza.

One of Bug's friends describes Incredible Pizza as "Chuck E. Cheese on steroids." Oh how true!

We invited 12 kids thinking that maybe 6 would accept. Having a party on a weeknight at 5:00 can make it difficult for people to attend. Only three didn't accept the invitation. I was glad that one of them made it. Dude's old friend David was able to come. They'd had the same kindergarten class last year and were in the same first grade class until David moved around Christmas break. It was good to see them be reunited after four months. They were glad to see each other.

The party was chaotic to say the least. Incredible Pizza is a buffet, so the kids were in and out of the party room getting food. The hostess got them to play "Simon says" and helped with cutting the cake and getting the presents together to be opened. The problem was she didn't really tell anybody that the presents were being opened. Joe and I looked down at the other end of the table, and there Dude was tearing into the first gift. We were supposed to have the party room for an hour, but overshot it a bit. It took awhile to calm the kids enough to give them the card to play the games. The cards are like credit cards instead of tokens. Of course, Dude's friend, David, lost his immediately after I'd stressed that they weren't replaceable. Luckily Dude is a good friend and shared his card with David. I'm just glad we didn't lose any kids and that some of the moms stayed and helped a bit. Of course, Joe was so put out about how everything went that he complained to the manager. Frankly, I think they needed to allow more time in the party room. It's supposed to be all you can eat, but both Joe and I left hungry since we didn't get much of a chance to eat. We hardly dared leave the room since the hostess kept ducking in and out. Oh well, live and learn.

Dude came away quite a bit richer. Not only did he get some great gifts, but three of the kids gave him cash which added up to about $40. I had him put it in his wallet after showing him how to calculate his tithing. He was bummed about "paying" that much. He didn't really want to, but he's a good kid. I explained that if he paid the Lord back some of what he received for his birthday, then maybe next time he's scheduled for a party, Joe and I just might be able to afford it. I think that writing a check from his savings account would have been easier on him since it doesn't feel like "real" money to him. Counting out those $1 bills was tough on him.

Next up, Bear will receive his Arrow of Light and Webelos badge on May 2nd and Dude will get baptized the next day, May 3rd. Family will be in for that which will be nice. We don't get that often.