5 Below hits a New High with Birthday Glee

5 Below, 16 girls, 4 moms, and 10 dollars each make a great birthday party.

In the early fall I started asking Brenna what she wanted to do for her birthday. We thought of several ideas and rather off handedly Brenna stated, she wished all the girls at her party could pick out a toy...which gave me the idea to do some sort of shopping birthday! I thought we could take a car full of girls to the shopping mall and they could each pick out a toy. Thinking it through, I thought I could have the girls pick 3 stores they would like to visit and shop for a toy. For a while I thought this was going to be it.

But then...an upscale dollar store called 5 Below opened in our neighborhood and became all the rage with the tweens. Tobin's friends loved it, Noah received a gift card to the store for his birthday and loved it, and Brenna loved it. So, walking into 5 Below one day, I realized this was the place to bring the girls to shop! Give them each 10 dollars and let them go wild in the store. It was new, it had a lot of hype, and it had lots of stuff for the girls to choose from! It was perfect! Carpe Diem!

I was excited to see how the girls would shop. I know some of Brenna's friends pretty well and thought I might know how they would shop. For instance, Kate would walk around the store and see everything before she chose anything, Brooke would put the first thing in her basket she saw, Mac would chose something and then have to put it back when she saw something else she really wanted, and so on. I thought I knew, but I knew there would be surprises along the way.
I talked to 5 Below and they were great about helping me manage the party of girls. The manager agreed to open a special cash register just for us that day. I mean great ideas like that don’t just grow on trees. They were also open to the idea of putting a pile of $1 bills at the register so as they needed it for tax they could just use it and the girls would be none the wiser. (I thought about including the tax in the $10 bill I gave them, but I could just see one of Brenna’s friends coming to me and saying, “You gave me ten dollars and this toy is $5 and this toy is $5. Why don’t I have enough for them?”—yeah, not going to work, so I simply decided to take care of tax. The other decision I had to make was to give the girls their $10.00 or hold onto it till they got to the register. I really felt that some of the fun for them would be to have the money in their hands, so I ended up giving it to them before entering the store. I only had one girl put it down to look at something and forget to pick it back up. Thankfully, the shopper realized what it was and gave me back the $10.00. And I found out whose it was and gave it back to her.
The actual day of the party was really nice. We met outside and waited for all of her friends. They had so much fun shopping. Luckily, I had three moms volunteer to help me out. I knew I wouldn’t be able to stay with all of them, once they were inside the store. The girls sort of divided up by what they wanted or what caught their eye. The girls had a great time and I had several other shoppers in the store ask me with enthusiasm if this was a birthday party. I felt happy answering “yes.” It took about 30 minutes for the girls to spend $10.00 and about ten minutes to go through the line. It was perfect and I knew everyone had had a great time!!
Then we headed for pizza and cake! It was a great birthday party for Brenna!

Brenna's Birthday

It is a tradition to lightly decorate our children's rooms on their birthdays so that when they wake up they know immediately they have been wished a happy birthday. It is always unspoken between us and the kids. It is just a known, a given. But on the eve of Brena's 8th birthday, she leaned over to her daddy's ear and whispered, "Don't forget to decorate tonight when I go to sleep."

Laughing or Crying???

Me: "Brenna, are you done in the shower already?"
Brenna: "Yes, mom and I even blow dried my hair."

Me (to Andy): "Wow, that was really fast. I'm going to go have Brenna try on her dress for her baptism; I'll be right back."

I walked up the stairs and met Brenna by her door. She immediately leaned down and said, "Mom, feel my hair. I blew it dry and...well, there's a little bit that's still wet, here, feel." Something about this statement and immediacy with which she said something as I walked up the stairs gave me a momentary blip on my radar screen. Hmmm...and then back to normal...

Until, I leaned down to kiss her freshly shampooed hair..and I didn't smell it. It dawned on me that this couldn't be the case; she couldn't have lied to me, but she did!!!

And over something so silly. A shower, seriously?

Should I laugh or cry?

Tobin's playoff game

Tobin played quarterback in the playoff game last week. If anyone were to watch the game, I feel Tobin did a great job. He had a lot to deal with, an opposing team that was giving him no mercy! I saw Tobin thinking on his feet, and making defensive decisions. Unfortunately, we weren't able to pull out a win. The Steelers, the team we played against, only lost one game all season. However, the one team that beat them was the team we beat! However, our season is over. There is so much I could write about this season--overall, I think it has been Tobin's toughest season mentally.

Dead Last, but Cute as a Button

She lost it on the landings. I think the last photo says it all. She knew. But she still had a good time. She woke up at 6:30 am and she has NEVER done that before. She was excited. I hope to get the videos up soon.

Brenna puts her Hands Up for Character

Brenna was so excited when her teacher chose her to be the first one of the year to put her hands on the pillar. Daddhy was able to be there to support her and giver her a hug and a kiss at the end. Way to go Brenna!

Andy's 40th Birthday

Andy turned 40 in the middle of October. I have planned for the last 5 years how we would celebrate his B-I-G birthday. In my mind it was always so fun and different and something people would remember! But it's amazing how in my daydreaming, I never imagined our current situation into the dream. Did I mention that in my birthday daydream, money grows on trees?

So, in a nutshell, my 40th birthday celebration daydream went up against our reality and goals of saving for a house. What to do? Save for the house we want so much to get back to or spend $$ on a night of revelry and fun? Since I haven't blogged I guess you know which one we chose. We went against the American way and decided we needed to save for our house. So, it has made it hard for me to blog about his birthday.

I must say though, that it truly was celebrated the way it should be celebrated--with family and a lot of love. We went with Andy to dinner at one of his favorite restaurants--The Pines. Italian through and through.











A second celebration at home on his actual birthday! The pjs give away that it was bedtime by the time we got to celebrate with Andy.



Happy Birthday, Andy!! One day, I will give you that party in my dreams.

Indoor Pool with Cousins