“Baby” turns 5!

Every year, when I celebrate back to back birthdays I am so, so , so grateful that they aren’t on the SAME day, like the doctor wanted.  I may have lost peripheral vision in one eye, but it was totally worth it to not have to throw two parties on the same day! 🙂

And talk about a birthday being special, Alexandra literally partied from morning til night.  It started off in Kindergarten, where she was the first child to celebrate their birthday this school year.  She chose the red crown and cape over the blue.  I knew she would, since it is the color closest to pink!  And check out this fun throne she got to rule her kingdom from! Part of her duties as birthday queen included choosing which games the children would play in her honor, AND getting to run them. Red cat meant the children had to stop dancing, green cat meant go totally crazy.  Whoever didn’t stop when she raised the red cat was out.

The kids all formed an archway with their arms, and then the ones at the back got to walk through it, with Birthday Lexi leading the way.  Look at that grin, she is having such a great time!

Each child gets a present from Frau Meier, as well.  The birthday child and two friends of their choice go outside while the other kids hide it somewhere in the room.  Then they play “Hot or Cold” to find it. It was hidden up in the “Leseecke” or reading corner.  She now wears her t-shirt with the pink kitty cat painted on it to bed, and loves it!

Alexandra also got to light and hold a sparkler, with adult supervision, of course. During cupcake time, some of the kids started laughing and pointing.  I turned around to see this.

They were hoping for some leftover cupcakes, but alas, Frau Meier let the little kids eat them all! 🙂

After the kindergarten festivities were over, I ran home to get everything ready for her friend party that afternoon.  The theme was Hello Kitty and we were both so excited.  I had been planning, creating and buying things for over a year!  And it was totally worth it.

She’s all ready, let the guests arrive!  We had lots of different coloring pages out on the floor, and as kids arrived they could choose one and color it.  It was a good way to keep them occupied until everyone showed up.

I told the kids that there was a stuffed Hello Kitty for each of them, hidden somewhere in the house.  Well, there were stuffed Chococats for the boys.  They ran all over everywhere, shrieking and laughing trying to find them.  I thought some of them were in pretty obvious hiding places, but we still had to help a couple kids find theirs.

Then, to encourage everyone to play and have fun, I showed them the prizes for participating in the games…clothes for the cats!  There were bows and dresses for the girls, and cute little shorts for the boys.  (The dresses were super fun to make, the shorts a bit more challenging.  Still, good practice for me.)

I had drawn a giant Hello Kitty face onto a piece of cardboard and sewed a felt bow for the kids to pin on her head.  We spun them around a couple of times, so that even though the picture was only 5 feet away, they had a tough time finding it.  A couple even put the bow on the bookcase.  What delighted me was that the boys who had expressed concern about attending such a girly party LOVED all the games and wanted to play them over and over.  Score one for me. 🙂

Then we played musical paw prints. We started the first round, and the kids were slipping and sliding around on the floor.  Apparently wooden floors, cardboard and socks are a dangerous combination.  So I stuck the paw prints down with masking tape, and it worked much better.  After several rounds, we were down to the final three. Nils won and received some chocolate for his paw print prowess.

My favorite game was having them lap milk from saucers. It was hysterical to watch.  I didn’t have quite enough saucers, so I had to use bowls.  They were all racing each other, because whoever drank all their milk first got a prize. Go, Lexi, go!

The last game was the absolutely simplest, and the hands down favorite of the entire crowd.  Balloon popcorn!  I had originally blow up a bunch of balloons to make them into flowers, like I had seen on Pinterest.  But there just wasn’t enough time after I got back from the Kindergarten party.  So I used them for this game instead.    All the kids grabbed a hold of the sheet, and we carefully lifted it up so that all the balloons stayed on it.  Then we shook it like crazy and watched them fly![youtube] http://youtu.be/eLv5WA_b2bM[/youtube]

We did that for quite a while, because they just didn’t want to stop.  Who knew?

By now, we were slowly running out of time.  I had counted on them wanting to play so many of the games more than once.  But we still had presents to open.  The tip of Hello Kitty’s ear determined which present Alexandra got to open next.  She was super excited about all of them, and I was glad she remembered to say thank you for each one.

Then we hurried over to the table to get the cake cut before parents started arriving to take the kids home. Sort of looks like a mouse, doesn’t it? 🙂

They mostly ate the cake, and then the kids took their stuffed animals, now all dressed, and goodie bags full of chocolates I made using a Hello Kitty mold, Hello Kitty stickers, and  Hello Kitty erasers and Hello Kitty writing pads, both of which were bought on clearance.  I love a good deal!

The kids helped me clean up from the party, since I had to leave right after the guests did to take Sarah to violin lessons.  That evening we had our family party with more presents, and leftover cake. 🙂 Sophie and Sarah had both made Alexandra jewelry and she loved it. Finally Alexandra was able to find out what was in the oddly shaped present Oma had left behind for her.  It wasn’t a snake, it wasn’t a stick, it was a ladybug umbrella! It was a pretty memorable, non-stop celebrating kind of day.  Happy birthday, Alexandra!