Oops!

How did I miss blogging on Rachel's birthday? In any case, her actual birthday turned out to be quite a fun day! We went to Kindermusik in the morning, and the whole class sang Happy Birthday to Rachel at the end. It was a gorgeous day, so in the afternoon we went to Springbank Park to feed the ducks. Too bad the ducks weren't back from the south yet! We ended up feeding the geese instead. Anna kindly napped in the stroller the whole time we were out, and didn't even scream that much when we stopped at Tim Horton's for a birthday donut (and ice capps for the grown-ups!) on the way home. Rachel played on the playground equipment at Springbank for a long time, and even climbed the chain rope ladder multiple times. She also made friends with a 2 1/2 year old girl and the two of them spent a few minutes happily handing rocks and sand to the mommies. Of course, it wasn't rocks and sand - it was ice cream!

We went out for her birthday lunch on April 7th instead of the 8th, because kids eat free on Mondays at East Side Mario's. Mind you, it wasn't so free after all since Ben and I decided to share a dessert that cost the same as the kids' meal would have been! Rachel had a great time and spontaneously thanked us for taking her out for a birthday lunch.

Her actual birthday party was on Sunday. Again, the weather was gorgeous, so we were able to get outside for awhile to play my ridiculous party game. A few days before her party, it occurred to me that maybe I should try to come up with something fun for the kids to do. Rachel has an elephant pool that she loves, and I thought about having rubber ducks in the pool for the kids to fish out. I figured that this would be easy to do. We'd write numbers on the bottom of the ducks and somehow make that correspond to prizes.

Little did I know that rubber ducks are scarce in London in the spring! Although I saw a bag of a dozen different colour rubber ducks about a week before Rachel's party, I could not find them anywhere after I decided to try this game. Ben and I went to Wal-Mart the night before the party (thanks, Grandma Karen! We had a really fun date, haha. Oh, wait. We did go to Starbucks and Ben got a free sandwich.). At Wal-Mart, it quickly became apparently that I was going to be the coolest Mom on the planet since I found juice boxes with ELEPHANTS on them. No ducks though.

On Sunday morning, I headed out to pick up a few things that we needed. I figured that either the Superstore or dollar store would have rubber ducks. Nope, no ducks there either. At 12:15 p.m., I called Ben to say that I was zipping down to the Westmount Zellers since I vaguely remembered possibly seeing rubber ducks there. Rachel's party was supposed to start at 2 p.m. No ducks at Zellers, but I did find a huge pack of temporary tattoos that I decided would make marvellous prizes.

Finally, in a moment of absolute desperation, I sprinted down to the dollar store in the mall. Well, sprinted is a slight exaggeration since my pelvic rotation has not yet gone away. In any case, I was moving as fast as I could! The dollar store had no ducks either. Thankfully, they DID have rubber seals and turtles. Rachel has a pretty good sense of humour, so I grabbed a bunch of seals and turtles and headed for home. (Yes, I stopped to pay on the way out.)

The kids all loved the game. Rachel and her friend Sarah were easily the most enthusiastic. Sarah's mom and I cheerfully (and sneakily) kept recycling their prizes by putting them back in the prize container instead of holding them in our hands. The game lasted much longer that way and the kids never noticed!

Rachel quite enjoyed being the centre of attention and having everyone sing to her, and she successfully blew out her candle and later talked about how she blew out the candle "and the fire went out!"

Her "birthday week" ended on Friday when she celebrated her birthday at pre-school during the weekly Shabbat party. Anna and I came in for the last 45 minutes of pre-school, so I got to see a little of what Rachel does there. Every time someone has a birthday, the other kids draw a picture of what they wish for the birthday child. Apparently Rachel has a little boyfriend at pre-school. ;) Evan wished her a blue birthday elephant. We've heard about Evan before. Rachel talks about him when telling us about show and tell: "Evan always guesses elephant!" Apparently Evan likes elephants too. When I asked Rachel if she'd like to have Evan over for a playdate, she thought that would be fun to show him all her elephants. I might actually have to pursue this.