A birthday celebration, COVID-style

 We have a six-year-old! Here he is.

We usually have a party for him at a place where I don't have to do anything but pay people to host his birthday party, but, you know. This year. I mean, Chuck E. Cheese and Urban Air and all of those places actually ARE hosting birthday parties, but everyone has to wear masks unless they're actively eating, so... meh. (Again, I'm pro-mask but hate wearing them.)

SO... for my niece's son's birthday, his dad rented a bounce house from Austin Bounce Rentals, where they have a 4-days-for-4-hour rental rate. This seemed like a cool idea, and we decided to do it for Mal, and then invite one friend over every day that we had it. I mean, it was a cool idea. But we're just really tired and ready to stay home and be potatoes for the next week!

Anyway, they brought the bounce house Wednesday, the day before Mal's actual birthday. His friend Alexei came that day, and brought his little sisters Anya and Adelina. It was our first chance to see baby Adelina, and she's super precious! The kids had lots of fun; we haven't seen each other since February. They've all grown up so much!

They brought Mal a cool foam ball slingshot and a bunch of Mario magnets. Mal has had a blast creating "scenes" for us on the refrigerator.

Thursday, on the actual birthday, Fox came over with his big brother, John Paul, and his little brother, Rex. The bounce house wasn't wanting to stay up, and after a while we just shut it off. The boys found plenty to do, and had fun running around half-naked and then spraying each other with the garden hose.

Fox brought Mal a BUNCH of Hershey bars (which is what I'd told his mom Mal liked when she asked) and also a Star Wars LEGO set and a couple of Star Wars books. One of them is kind of a who's who and the other is an Eye-Spy-type book where you find Chewbacca and a bunch of bounty hunters on every page.

Friday was family day. Ken, Travis, Tian, Hannah and Chance, and Pappy and Nana came out. The bounce house place had brought us a second blower, so we were going strong again.

The Brownies got Mal four Super-Mario-themed Hot Wheels, and Nana and Pappy brought him some Sonic LEGOs (which they're building in the picture above). We'd actually given Mal a set of Super Mario LEGOs, so he really has an embarrassment of riches, building-bricks-wise.

Today was the last party day, and it went so well. I was basically exhausted this morning, and not terribly excited to have more company. But Mal and Harrison played together beautifully, and it was the first day that it was hot enough to turn the water on in the bounce house and have it feel REALLY good.

It was a great week, catching up with friends we haven't seen in a while, and playing outside SO much. It was fun celebrating with Mal!

In the midst of all of this, we had another episode of needing Mal to take magnesium citrate, and he's gotten to be such a dang trooper about it. Also, no, his tooth hasn't fallen out yet.

The bounce house goes away tomorrow, and when I reminded Mal of this, he cried. A lot. He thought I'd bought it. I tried to calm him down by saying we could certainly look for a bounce house (although a toddler-sized one I looked at earlier this year was $700; the one we rented would be about $1200 used and more than $2000 new) later, and I think Mal's onto my stalling tactics. He said, "Mom, I'm afraid you're not going to do what you are saying." He's not wrong. I don't lie to him, but I do sometimes say things to calm him down like this, even though I know there's no way we're buying a bounce house. Sigh. He's getting so big. And cynical. Just like everyone else in the household. I'm both proud and concerned because now I have to think of something different to do.

Early Life Crisis?

The couple of days leading up to Mal's 4th birthday were... interesting.

He expressed a great deal of opposition to having a birthday. He didn't want a party. He wanted to stay 3. He also spent Sunday and Monday having ideas of things he wanted to do, then just getting inconsolably upset about things I didn't understand, and telling me that I had ruined his day or ruined his birthday.

Monday he woke up and said, "I just want you to go pick up my cake for me." Of all the reasons I booked a party at Chuck E. Cheese, the grocery-store cake was not among the most important.

He agreed to go, and was ready to leave the house by 9 AM. We were supposed to be there at 10:45 to set up for the 11 o'clock party. Finally, at about 9:45, we went ahead and took off. I drove slowly (don't laugh; I actually set my cruise control for 5 under the speed limit), got gas, and we stopped by the Salvation Army store to kill 15 minutes or so.

The party ended up being a lot of fun. Mal loved it, loved having his friends there, and, of course, loved the cake. And pizza. Between birthday extras and people just handing their tickets over to him, Mal ended up with something like 2700 tickets, easily a record for us. However, he seemed unimpressed with the bigger offerings newly-available to him. He ended up walking out with 4 gummy Ring Pops and a bunch of points for later.

Just so I'll remember (because I have pictures of D's 5th birthday that include a little girl of whom I have zero recollection), Harrison, Alexei and his sister Anya, Blake and her brother Canyon, and Loki and his brother Zephyr came to Mal's party, plus Nana and Pappy and everyone's designated adult.

We finally gave Mal the LandSpeeder we bought him at 75 percent off when Toys R Us was closing. It took two days, but Mal finally sat in it and pressed buttons. He still won't drive it. He's waiting for Harrison to come over and drive it, and he says he'll sit beside Harrison.

The first thing Mal said to me on Tuesday was, "See? I woke up and I didn't turn 4." I had to break it to him that he was fully four on that day, though he'd gotten a reprieve during his actual party because he'd been born 19 minutes after his party officially ended.

The rest of the day and most of today has been much easier, emotionally-speaking. Mal wanted to go back to Chuck E. Cheese today, and because of a card we got for booking online and some left-over plays Pappy gave us, we were able to play for an hour with nothing out of pocket.

So... this time last year, Mal was finally ready to start using a toilet. Six weeks before his 3rd birthday, I thought we were still months and months away from it, but he was out of diapers during the day at his party. Since May of this year, we've had some regressions with his willingness to go when he needs to defecate, and I'd blame the switch from the training toilets to the big ones, but it wasn't a direct correlation.

However, a couple of times this week, he's just gone without my knowing (rather than my reading his face and ordering him to go NOW) and has called me in to help him finish.

Another cool thing is that he's been mostly dry overnight for a few months. I wasn't super committed to getting rid of the nighttime Pull-Ups just because I don't love taking the bedding off in the middle of the night, and I knew we definitely wanted to do Pull-Ups on vacation, using a bed that doesn't have waterproof covering. He was only wet twice during that 9-night stay, and has only been wet once in the 9 nights since we returned. The night before last, I let him go to sleep without a diaper on, but chickened out in the middle of the night. Last night, no Pull-Up and he was dry.

The cool thing is that, during the past week or so, he's been receptive to my encouragement to use the restroom before we go somewhere and, especially, before we go to bed. That's a huge change, and I'm loving it.

So he's growing up a lot, but also resisting growing up. He's a super fun kid, and spending time with him is an unmitigated blessing. Here's to Year Five!

Review: Austin's Baked by Amy's birthday party experience

Yesterday afternoon was cold and rainy, but my nieces, nephews, kids, sister, mom, and I had a fun time decorating at Baked by Amy's. Amy's Ice Creams is a long-time Austin staple, and last year, they opened up their first bakery on 183 in the iFly building (Anderson Mills exit at 183 North). It is conveniently located next to an ice cream shop and Phil's Ice House, which will be awfully handy if you consume as much sugar as we did, but we'll get to that part in a bit...

First of all, the nitty-gritty: Birthday parties at Baked by Amy's start at $200 and can accommodate up to 8 kids (or participants, as they were completely gracious to us adults, so I'm sure they wouldn't balk if you and your best friends showed up ready for some creative, tasty fun). Beyond that, it's $25 per person, and it includes invitations! We had booked last minute, and it wasn't anyone's birthday, so we didn't get the invitations, but you'll see why I feel like this was a great deal...

When we arrived, everything was set up. I'd told her there would be 6-8 of us, and there were 9 places set up, plus the one for the baker.

Oh, and it's in a bakery, so in addition to it looking awesome, it smelled AMAZING.

So, yes, we were set up in the lobby, in front of this deliciousness. We had participants from 5-15... or to 69, if you count the three adults. The youngest two made personalized "chef's" hats (they are really more like food-service or soda jerk hats, but I'm not splitting hairs about that). I'm sure the bigger kids could have done this, too, but the girl who hosted our party didn't pander to them.

Each setting had two cookies (one round and one with a flat end and arced end, both shortbread), two cupcakes (one chocolate and one vanilla), some gummy bears, a few Oreos, and a couple of spoons. There were different-colored icings in cups around the table, as well as some white icing, and a bunch of parchment paper piping bags.

When everyone was ready, the hostess got things started by showing everyone how to make a sunflower decoration on a cupcake.

Put some icing into a piping bag.

Um, mine looks vaguely like a flower, right?

Her leaves were much more precise.

Travis might have sneaked some icing into his mouth. Just maybe.

Some embellishments.

The hostess was so helpful, willing to show extra tricks and give us tips.

The next cupcake, she said to decorate however we wanted. A word of caution, though: tell your kids not to use up the Oreos (like I did!) because you'll need them later!

Next, she showed us how to decorate one of the cookies to look like an owl. Here is the pro's:

I'd used my Oreos (well, I used two and accidentally ate the other one), so...

Another...

Then we decorated the other cookie however we wanted to.

After we had all decorated our stuff, we got to head into the kitchen to see the professional do her thing!

She put together a Neapolitan cake for the kids' enjoyment (and ours). 

They even got to help plane the frosting.

She explained that sprinkles or cake crumbs or nuts can hide errors in the icing. Nice tip!

Next, it was time to write the Happy Birthday message, but since we weren't celebrating anything special, the kids had her write "lasagna."

This cake was HUGE. I guess it's a 10-inch cake, but it looks like a monster. Now, I've bought 6-inch cakes from bakeries before that were $80 (it did have a custom design, though), so when you think about the price of this party, and that it includes not only this cake but all of the stuff we made (which is boxed up and you get to take with you), then this is a very reasonable party, price-wise!

All of the kids loved it, from the 5-year-old to the 15-year-old. Each kid can decorate to their own ability, and have as much or as little assistance as they want.

My daughter has had birthday parties at a skating rink and at a gym, and I paid about this much for those facilities, still having to provide the cake and any gift bags we wanted to hand out.

But, as every parent knows, one of the best parts of having a party, especially a crafty party like this, anywhere other than in your own home, is that when it's over, you can just walk away from this:

The aftermath!

You can book your party via email or by calling the bakery (info listed on the website linked to above). A 50% deposit is necessary to hold your reservation.

To review: invitations; 1.5 hour party with dedicated host; chef's hat, 2 cookies, and 2 cupcakes per child; all necessary decorations; 10-inch cake;(the website says "lemonade," but they must have forgotten it in our case); and CLEAN-UP included at $200 for up to 8 kids, and $25 per person beyond that.