Success!

The Bear's first "real" birthday party with his buddies was fabulous!

I can't believe how well it turned out. We had 7 kids that attended. 5 boys. 2 girls. The girls? They have the same name. Both are adorable too. The boys? They are definitely all boys. Rough and tumble. A bundle of energy each. Thank goodness we didn't have the party at our house. They would have torn it up!

Saturday morning I was getting the gift bags finished up. I had to pop 3 bags of popcorn and put them into ziplocs and then into the gift bags. I wanted the kids to have "fresh" popcorn so that's why I waited until that morning instead of doing it the night before. I was getting lots of tiny things finished up, so I didn't even hear my cell. My phone rang twice. Two parents were calling me to let me know they'd be at the party. Yes! I had two RSVPs about an hour before the party. But I figured that would happen so I had the gift bags ready.

We had some great coordinators at the bowling alley. Two young ladies who were full of energy. They were quick at getting the kids shoes. They would touch base with me every 15 minutes or so. They got our drinks quickly. They were great.

What is unfortunate is that we had an HOUR of bowling. And with these 5 year olds? They lost interest in bowling after about 30 minutes. The lights and sounds of the bowling alley games called to them. We ended bowling after about 45 minutes. The coordinators realized that the kids were not bowling anymore and got us into the room sooner than we were designed to be there. YEH!

Even though there was sanitizer lotion at the entry into the party room, I handed each kid a Handi-wipe. I just am squeamish about them putting their fingers into their mouths after touching all the bowling balls and all that. I didn't want them to get any weird germs. Ugh! And then they happily ate their pizza and drank their pink lemonade. We opened the gifts after this. Oh these kids! They were SO excited to have the Bear open THEIR gift. I felt claustrophobic. They were less than a foot away from us. I just had to laugh though because they were having such a good time. Even though it was a bit chaotic. The Bear hugged each friend after he opened their gift. He was so gracious. After the gifts, we brought the cake out. One of the gifts sat right next to the Bear. He-he-he! I actually brought chocolate milk, so the kids had that with their cake (which was a yummy chocolate too). Then after that? We handed each child a gift bag AND a game card so they could play the video games.

It was great that we didn't have to clean up after. The coordinators took care of everything. The Bear had a good time. His friends had a good time. We had a good time. SUCCESS!