Party Girl

Daphne went to her first real birthday party this week! It was her friend Josh's 3rd birthday. Technically Daphne barely knows Josh, but his mom Kristine and I are friends so that makes our kids friends by default. Back to the story....Josh turned 3 on the 31st. Kristine had a cute little party for all the little kids. I'm not sure how much older they all are than Daphne--she's only 4 months younger than Josh--but she looks like a midget next to them. Still, she had a blast. First the kids all got balloons that they could shake and wave around to music. They loved that. Then it was time to decorate their treat bags. Daphne was all over that--she loves to draw. She also go to put stickers on her bag and had her first encounter with stamps, which thrilled her. Next the kids got to sing Happy Birthday and watch Josh blow out the candles on his cupcake cake with the Cars theme. Daphne made a total mess out of her cupcake (trying to eat off all the frosting w/o eating any cake, of course). Then Josh opened presents. The last game was a box full of instruments that the kids got to pound, shake, whistle, clap, and blow to their heart's delight. It was pretty chaotic in there for a while, but they were all loving it. Finally we had to go. As we were leaving, an entire swat team was arriving about 3 houses down. It turned into a full-on stand-off with one of Kristine's neighbors, a veteran with PTSD. I've never seen so many rifles and AK47's in one place! Or at all, for that matter. (http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=2581482) Anyway, it was a fun party. Daphne still has a little trouble focusing and following directions, but she had a great time. Hopefully if we can keep taking her to parties like this, she'll be conditioned to handle her own in about 4 months.