Did you know?

My Kbear turned FIVE! Five....that's slowly but surely moving out of little kid territory and into big kid land. Five means that she can go to Kindergarten. Five means that when someone asks her how old she is, this is the last year she'll only use one hand to show them.

Five is a big girl.

Kbear's birthday rocked this year. I am so proud of the party we put together. In between all of the stress over Chunker's surgery I wasn't sure I could pull it off but in the end, it was fabulous.

A few months ago, I asked K what kind of birthday party she wanted. I had already decided that I would take the plunge and invite all of her pre-school classmates - usually I just pull together a list of all of our adult friends, with kids and without and we go from there. But everyone is busy with the holidays coming, and I thought it would be fun to let K decide who came.

It was....an adventure. LOL



Anyway, Kbear had asked for a "Puppy and Kitty" party. And during our brainstorming session, she had an epiphany that only a four year old would have - "Let's get presents for kitties and doggies, Mom!"

I was intrigued. With Christmas right around the corner, complete with it's influx of STUFF, I certainly knew that the last thing we needed was more toys for me to trip over in the middle of the night, but I wasn't sure how to turn the concept into a party. Finally, the light bulb came on.

On Sunday (the day before Chunk's hospital visit), we welcomed all of Kbear's friends to "Dr. K's Pet Clinic" and had a blast. We had asked each guest to bring their favorite "stuffed animal pet" for a check up and instead of gifts for the birthday girl, we asked each family to contribute something that the local animal shelter could use. The response was absolutely awesome - I was blown away by every one's generosity.



This year I decided not to even contemplate having a dozen kids at my house. We reserved a community room in town and it was the best move I've ever made, birthday party wise. When our mini-guests arrived, we had name tags ready for them that signified them as "Guest Vets" for the day. We read the book "I Want to be a Vet" and then sent them on their way - The kids made collars for their pets out of paper and stickers, they colored pictures for the animal shelter, and we had an exam station set up - complete with charts and checklists for each pet, measuring tapes, a scale, gauze, and an assortment of toy doctor odds and ends. We all snacked on "rabbit food" (a veggie tray), "Lizard dip" (spinach dip and crackers), and "Kitty Kat Crunchies (pretzels).

The kids played "bandage the puppy" where they wrapped each other up in toilet paper and then they raced to see who could push kitty jingle bells across their room first - using only their noses! We had a cake shaped like a bone (courtesy of the forever-creative Skippy) and ice cream and orange soda.

We had 14 kids in attendance, and it was loud and crazy and fun. I think that K had a fantastic time. And when it was all over, we had a TON of stuff for the animal shelter. Many of K's friends were sweet enough to include stickers or small gift cards or five bucks in her card as well, so she still got a little bit of loot but the majority of her haul was for the animal shelter. It was a blast.



Her party was on Sunday. Monday was Chunk's whirlwind day at the hospital, and then Tuesday, K got the spotlight again when we celebrated her actual birthday. After we dropped off all of her shelter donations (much to the overwhelming delight of the staff) we had lunch at Google and then she had her hair cut. She requested spaghetti for dinner, we opened presents from family, and then we ate cupcakes.

The two days combined to make a memorable and fun herald to my little (big) girl's fifth birthday. We can't thank her friends enough for helping us pull it off with their wonderful contributions, but most importantly, my kid had a great time.