Happy Birthday Kaylee!

Today Kaylee turns 8 years old...maybe 8 going on 13. :) She has had just a fantastic day, and still is as I type this. Her first seven birthdays she had a party with her family, and she would take cupcakes or cake to school, and one year she was able to come out to Glenndale for a Friday lunch and we had a little cake and party there with the grownups. So this year will be the first birthday she's had where she got to invite other kids to a party, and she is excited about it.

Steve and I woke her up this morning by sneaking in her room and singing "Happy Birthday" to her, and she got up and threw herself on us for a big hug. We got ready about half an hour early, and I told her to dress up a little more than usual for school, which she was happy to do. On our way in, I stopped at the store so she could pick out some fresh cupcakes to take into school today, and I walked them in with her. I had told Kaylee that she would have a big surprise when she got out of school, and she had been talking about it with her teachers, so they were curious too. Steve had been jokingly telling Kaylee it was going to be elephant poop, so that's what she told her teachers it would be. As I was leaving, one teacher said to another "We aren't going to come out here and find an airplane in our parking lot, are we?" I started laughing, turned around and said "No, that would be illegal. No airplanes." Then I came back and informed them of what the surprise was going to be, and they loved it. Later, when I picked Kaylee up from school, her teacher came up to me and said "Oh, you can't ever tell me any more secrets like that, because I had the worst time not spilling it!" :)

I told them that Kaylee has been wanting to save her money for a long time to buy a pink limousine, has talked about it for almost a year. So Steve decided we should rent a limo for her for her birthday, which I thought was over the top. But then he looked into it, and it was really not very expensive at all, and Kaylee would definitely get a thrill out of it, and we've never done any outside birthday events before, so...why not.

So after I dropped Kaylee off at school, I came home and did a bit of work, changed clothes and went out to Glenndale for Friday lunch, until 2 p.m. when it was time for the Big Surprise. Steve and Chuck came out to Kaylee's school in the Jeep, and Judy and I went in her Jeep with Maggie and Hannah, and we waited for the limo to arrive. He was supposed to be there by 3:40 pm, and as 3:40 approached I started getting a little nervous as the thought occurred to me that I could have told Kaylee I'd have a big surprise right out front for her when she got out of school, that she had been excited about it for days, and that he might not show. He ended up getting there a couple of minutes late, which happened to be exactly at the right time. I found out later that Steve was enjoying watching me start to get twitchy, while he was on the phone with the guy and knew where he was all along. I keep forgetting to smack him for that. ;)

Well, when the driver pulled up front, I got out and started to walk up and get Kaylee, but she and her entire class along with several of the teachers came pouring out of the doors, and you should have heard them. Kaylee had a look of total shock on her face, and was I believe actually speechless. Her friends were yelling and laughing and swarming around to see and saying "Awesome!!!" They all got to look inside, and then the driver rolled out a red carpet, handed Kaylee a red rose, and helped her inside the limo. She was still fairly speechless. Maggie, Hannah, Judy and myself climbed in after her, and away we went for some driving around town. Steve was there to video tape it, but he ended up not videotaping anything but pavement because he was so caught up in watching what was going on. He's going to have to stick with his day job and leave the videographing to others, I think. ;) Steve and Chuck dropped Judy's vehicle off at our final destination and headed on home.

The drive was fun. The kids spent time playing, looking outside, checking out the interior, people watching as people would watch them too, and they liked that nobody could see in but they could see out. After we started out, Maggie asked if I wanted to tell Kaylee the rest of the surprise-I had almost forgotten! So I told Kaylee we were going to Chuck E Cheese, and she got all excited. Then I asked her if she wanted the rest of her surprise, and she said something like "You're killing me here!" I told her that tonight Maggie got to spend the night and that she was going to get to have her first ever sleepover. She slapped her hands to her face, and said "I have to scream! I can't scream in here, can I? I need to scream!" She was so excited.

The limo was very nice, with soft leather seats, mirrors and glass, "Happy Birthday" confetti sprinkled onto the floor, and the 'bar' area had been set up just for her with balloons, birthday napkins, decorations, a sign, etc. There was one sunroof, and on the other end was a dark mirror with LED lights set up like twinkling stars. I caught Kaylee gazing outside, gazing at the lights, gazing at the mirrors, sometimes very thoughtfully and sometimes excitedly. She came up to me once and said "Can I keep it?" (Um, no.) Then she cuddled up to me and said "Thank you" in a most sincere and slightly awed voice. A few minutes of playing later, she looked around and said "I can't believe you and Daddy got all this just for me". Another playtime followed by "NOW I know why you wanted me to dress up more today. And clean my room." She loved it and was very appreciative, and all the girls had a fun time.

So we pulled in front of Chuck E Cheese, the driver opened the door and helped us all out, which ended Kaylee's first and memorable experience in a limo, and we started Phase Two of birthday day. I got the kids some food and some tokens and turned them loose, and we were there for more than two hours. They had a great time dancing in front of the screen and making these little hard plastic cards with their photos on them and just playing games. Eventually it was time to go. Judy had taken Hannah home to get some sleep, so Chuck came back and picked up me and the girls and brought us back to Glenndale where my car was, and I brought the girls home where they played really well all evening.

Kaylee set up her princess tent in the front living room, we stocked it was soft blankets and pillows and lights, and the girls stayed awake talking until past 11 pm. :O They were just too excited to get to sleep.

It was just a neat, fun day. Of course I took too many photos of the kids in the limo, but I was too tired to figure out which photos to cull out and which to leave, so I just stuck them all up, Page One and Page Two both.

Kaylee's really grown up a lot in the last year, almost too much. I enjoyed seeing her have such a wonderful, fun, memorable birthday, with more fun to come tomorrow!