Happy Birthday to Archie!

Ok, long overdue is a recap of Archie's birthday!

His birthday is a tough one here in Cincinnati. Something we've struggled with for the past two years. The first one after we moved, we went to Mobile for the celebration. The second one we had two parties--one up here and one later in the month in Mobile. So this one was going to be a challenge since Archie loves having all his cousins and Mobile friends at his birthday.

I've not been in very good planning mode lately, so I asked Phillip to get with Archie and plan something, anything that would be sufficient. Which Phillip got right on and worked out everything. Ha ha. Yeah right.

I asked Archie what he wanted to do and his first request was, of course, to go to Mobile for his birthday. That wouldn't work out this year. So his second request was to have all of his cousins, grandparents, and friends from Mobile come up to Cincinnati and have the party. We tried to explain that the logistics of that would be...um...impossible.

Archie ultimately said he really wanted to spend his birthday with his friends Adam and Caleb, who, fortunately, are located in the Tri-state area! So we had a starting place!

So after Phillip's not coming up with a plan, and not coming up with a plan, and NOT coming up with a plan some more, I finally came up with something with less than a week to spare. I checked and got the okay from Archie. Hurray!

For Phase One, we met up with Susie, Adam and Caleb at the Museum Centre of Cincinnati. I am a cheap, um...I mean frugal kind of Mama, so we didn't do an 'official' Museum Centre themed birthday party...we went to the Children's Museum and just happened to bring a cake with us!

The kids had a blast! They played and romped and it was easy-peasy for me because I didn't have to worry about them being rowdy at home or anything. And I got to sit and chat with Susie (their Mom) and Phillip ran around after Lawrence most of the time. After we took in the Children's Museum for a while, we went up to the atrium area and had birthday cake! We sang a quick Happy Birthday, blew out the candles and had cake and juice.

Oh, yes...I must mention, that Susie, Adam and Caleb got Archie a terrarium with two frogs. Yes, frogs! Archie was so excited! The frogs currently reside on our mantle, front and center! I told Susie that it was a good thing it wasn't a puppy--because it would be going back home with her!!! :-)

After the Museum Center, we were exhausted. We took a short rest, then Archie had his soccer playoffs at the rec center. Phillip went with him and I stayed home with the still-sleeping Lawrence.

After soccer, we went to Chuck-E-Cheese's for the 'family' portion of the birthday party. Chuck-e-cheese is a real treat for Archie because it is not a place Phillip or I love to go very often. The pizza is usually terrible and everything is kind of...well...sticky. The only redeeming quality of Chuck-e-cheese for me is playing ski-ball. So I don't complain about a trip there once in a great while.
Once again, because I am cheap um, I mean frugal, I didn't go the 'official' birthday route. We just went for dinner, fun and games. We had a great time and even had a visit from Chuck-E himself! Here are some photos of our evening:

Getting ready to play games!

As you can see from the look on his face, Lawrence was really excited about all the singing robot bears.

This kid loves animals! He liked riding in the cars with the characters.

After we closed down Chuck-E's, we headed home to open birthday presents. I dunno why I didn't take any present photos. I must've been really tired! We called my folks on Skype so they could watch him open presents too. He racked up on cool presents with the 09 season Reds baseball cards, miscellaneous other baseball cards, a binder for all these danged cards that end up all over the place, the long-coveted Eyeclops, some cash for his wallet, a new board game, some clothes, a dart gun, some quicksand, the Lego StarWars Wii game, and some tootsie roll pops, which Lawrence The Torrence tried to sneakily abscond with as soon as they came out of the box. He got found out before the unwrapping could begin. But it wasn't for lack of trying! He's a sneaky one!

Archie said it was the best birthday ever! Thank goodness! We pulled another one outta the hat! Happy Eighth, my Archie-Bear!