I'm SO not okay that my oldest child is turning 9 and that means next year she'll be fully double digits and then we get to prep for the pre-teen age (then, of course, comes the teenage phase that I'm dreading a little bit). In fact, I kept joking that I'm not ready for her to be 9 so let's just say she is 6 again. She said she didn't like that because then she'd be younger than Gwen, haha. I joked Gwen can go back to 5 or 4 and Lucy can be 2. None of them went for that idea though.
It was even better that her birthday just happened to be a Saturday, which means her party could be on her actual birthday! However, because of that I asked her if she wanted to do all her other birthday stuff on her birthday too (normally their birthday day they get a special table and they choose a special breakfast and dinner). She chose to do the table and breakfast on Friday and her dinner on Sunday (today) so she got a whole birthday weekend.
For her breakfast, she chose French Toast with strawberries. I made sure to get the Texas Toast to make it even yummier. She loved her table as well, she got some more masks, some gum, and film for a print camera as well as a couple of her gifts.
For her party, on Saturday, she said she wanted another one at home because then she gets to invite a lot of friends. We were looking at different places we could do a party that would let her invite more, but then I saw this idea for a gaming truck to come to your house and thought that would be SO much fun. She loves gaming, but she did mention she didn't want to do an arcade because some of her friends might not be into arcades and games like that. When I showed her the truck idea she said she LOVED that idea, we even found one truck that brought yard games for kids in case they didn't want to game so it worked perfect.
Of course, then she went to a different friend's party that was KPop Demon Hunter themed and she decided she wanted that to be part of her party as well. So, we got KPop invites, table clothes, decorations, and even a special candle for her cake (this was mostly because the cake place didn't have a KPop specific theme so we ordered a singer/pop star theme and then got the candle separately).
We sent her out with about 18 invites and it turned out pretty much all of them showed up, with the exception of two kids (who are siblings) because they got sick and couldn't make it, which was a bummer since it was one of her closest friends so she was really excited to see them. We had a FULL house (luckily we've learned to put the cats in a room upstairs so we don't stress out so much about the constant in and out or if doors are open, it's much more stress free that way).
So the day of her party was incredibly busy, we're still in soccer season AND it's the first weekend of the month. This means I had to take the kids to the soccer games in the morning, while Larry ran around getting the cake, the workshop kits for the month (and because we normally get donuts after the workshop for birthday months he was kind enough to go grab those as well), and then he met up with us at the games. We ran home to do a quick lunch and then back out to the last soccer game. After that, we rushed home to clean, clean, clean (which luckily didn't take too long) and then we had about 1 hour to relax before the party started.
After cleaning, I had to run to the dollar store to get some extra table cloths (when we added up how many RSVP'd, we realized we needed more tables/seating and the tables looked pretty gross, so we had to cover those up. While at that store, I figured we should get more cups and then I found some bubbles the kids might like and what I thought was some party blowers (that blow out the rolled up paper tube thing)...turns out those were kazoos and that was a HUGE mistake with so many kids! Once the kids showed up they all loved to grab the kazoos and start blowing them and it was a madhouse of noise and chaos. We ended up saying kazoos and bubbles are outside toys.
So once enough kids showed up, we told them all to grab some food and drinks (we even cut up some extra fruit we had and offered root beer, kool aid, or water as drinks). When everyone was settled with food, we broke out the cake (after singing Happy Birthday, of course) and then while they ate we did presents. As we were wrapping up the presents, the game truck showed up, and everyone thought it was so cool! Mom and Will had come, we were all very "noised out" by this point, so it was nice to send the kids out to the truck and then we sat out front to just chat and relax. It was crazy because you could hear ALL the noise from outside the truck, even with the doors closed!
Some of the kids did get sick of the games, so they came out to play with bubbles. Gwen also preferred that so she hung out more with those kids (she even said they are her new friends, but she didn't remember/know their names, haha). But the kids definitely had fun. We apologized to the gaming people a lot because they had to stay inside and it was REALLY loud, we could tell. After a couple hours, we heard them put on the "When Will I See You Again" song from Wreck-It-Ralph while showing the kids a slideshow of the pictures they took of them playing. They all came out saying it was so much fun.
When the parents came to pick the kids up, even they commented how the truck looked really cool and how they might have to use it for their kids' parties. I thought "well, at least they'll get more business from this chaos." It was funny because the few parents I did see come (we had 16 kids but I swear I only saw 5 parents come, so I assume everyone got home just fine) they mentioned we were very brave to have so many kids come over. I'm glad I can handle it, even though it is a tad overwhelming.
Cara said this was her best birthday ever and she wants to do the gaming truck again and again (we'll see about that, haha). I'm glad we can provide such fun parties for her. I figure I can handle one day (or 4 in my case, with 4 kids) a year that's crazy and chaotic to give them such fun memories with their friends. It was funny to see some neighbor kids walk/bike by our house and zone out to the gaming truck, it did seem like it was such a hit!
She definitely got spoiled with some gifts. One friend's dad made her a Rumi balloon figure, she got some games, some bags, some stuffies. So many good things! From us, she got new shorts, a chapter book series (a sequel to "Trapped in a Video Game" called "Escape from a Video Game" which is kind of a choose your own adventure type), a new bag for dance or soccer stuff, a Rumi Funko Pop figure, and the Kpop Demon Hunters soundtrack CD...introducing the kids to CDs has been SO much fun! Gwen asked "what's a CD?" Lucy asked where the controller for the boom box was, and Cara asked how to open the CD case. They've become obsessed with playing CDs anytime they were doing something.
Tonight, for dinner, Cara chose Golden Corral. We definitely stuffed ourselves with that and loved every minute of it. We also included the "what we love about Cara" part to dinner. I love doing that to make them feel special. And we measured her height on our ruler thing as well. Overall, it was a great weekend of celebrations. We love our oldest, independent, most friendly girlie ever!
To Cara,
I have absolutely loved watching you grow up. It's bittersweet, because without pictures I can really only remember the last few years clearly. I hope I've made you feel as special as you are. You are SO smart, so friendly, so sweet, and so strong. I truly believe you could be anything because you love trying everything out (except food, you are quite picky and stubborn with food, haha).
I absolutely love that you make friends so easily, but it makes me sad you are to that age where you prefer to be with your friends. But I understand everyone goes through that and that's why I go on field trips and let you invite so many kids over so that I can see who you are hanging out with and spending time with and make sure they are good ones.
I love how much you still love to read. You even said your brain doesn't care what it's reading, it just likes reading. That is one reason I believe you'll go so far in life. You also say you like to be busy with different activities, so whenever I ask if you want to try something new out you say "yes" without hesitation.
You have become SUCH a gamer girl and I think that's one of your favorite ways to spend time. Because of this you and Dad are pretty much BFF and while it's a little bittersweet for me, I'm actually very happy you have such a good dad that will do that with you.
You are so adventurous and love to go on roller coasters. You say you want to keep riding The Cannibal ride at Lagoon because it scares you, but you like it, haha. We took you on Wicked for the first ride when we went last month and even though I had a panic attack of you guys falling out (it didn't help when you started yelling out "help me! Help me! Help me!" because you were having so much fun, haha), you said you loved it and wanted to do more haha.
You are doing so great at soccer, I know you don't get goals often, but watching you learn to play as a team has been a good thing for you. I know you get pretty competitive, so watching your sisters make goals hasn't been easy for you, but once you get over the jealousy, you're so supportive and a great big sister for them. I think you butt heads with Gwen the most, but sometimes you guys play like you are twins and couldn't live without each other. Those moments warm my heart, because after having you I knew I had to give you a sibling and Gwen is almost opposite of you so you balance each other well.
I love you, sweetie, and I hope you know I will ALWAYS be there and support you no matter what you do in life. I am your #1 fan and will always help guide you whenever you need it (and I'll try not to hold onto your wings too much when you decide you're ready to fly!).
Love, Mom!
