We don’t do gifts at our kids’ parties with friends, but that doesn’t mean that we don’t have some fun family gifts. We had planned on having cake and presents after our Saturday morning party with friends, but someone turned four on Tuesday, and by Friday she could not wait another second.
She got several new books, including a new book illustrated by a family favorite, Jon Klassen.
We also got her the poetry anthology from Caroline Kennedy – Poems to Learn by Heart. I loved Jon Muth’s watercolor illustrations in her first collection, and I’m excited to read these with the girls. Both of them love poetry, and they also love big thick books with lots of choices!
E spent the past week with my parents, and so the girls were so glad to be reunited on Friday. E picked out the latest Ladybug Girl book as her gift to F – a particularly cute one where the family goes camping.
Speaking of Ladybug Girl – some Lulu wannabe got her own set of Ladybug boots from my parents – and she barely took them off all weekend (including at the fountain!).
M and I gave her a set of sticker books – she’s been really into stickers lately, and I’ve been telling the girls about my extensive sticker collection I had when I was little. F will ask me to tell her about the “sticker parties” and I’ll tell her how we’d have slumber parties with friends, and all the gifts would be sticker related, and we’d all bring our sticker books and carefully sort and apply them to each page. Good times, 1982.
She also got this amazing bedside table from M’s parents. I don’t have a great photo of it from the opening, but I’ll take some pictures of it in her room once I get the artwork over her new bed and table back on the wall and everything in its place. It’s the Jenny Lind nightstand from Land of Nod – like E’s red bed – and the aqua looks so good in her bedroom. Grandma also remembered a new set of Dora tissues to have by the bed – which was great, since we had just finished off the last box. Grandma’s never forget these important details.
Another thing we like to do in our family is pass things down – we do it with clothes, for sure – but we also do it with those really nice gifts that might get outgrown but still have tremendous play value in them. There’s no reason not to continue getting use out of those items, and there’s also no reason why they can’t be wrapped up with a big bow on top either. We’ve done this with lots of things – tricycles and exersaucers and beautiful wooden toys like this modern dollhouse. It’s a huge, huge hit, let me tell you.
It’s good – very good – to be four.
Hi there! I was curious about your no gifts at the parties with friends. I think that is a really nice idea, to make the focus of the party on having fun with friends rather than getting gifts, but I was wondering if you’ve ever had problems with your kids feeling upset that they didn’t get gifts from their friends? Do you bring gifts when you go to other birthday parties? If so, have you ever had to explain to your girls why you give gifts to their friends, but their friends don’t give gifts to them?
You read my mind – I was already writing something on this subject after a few people asked me about it recently. I’ll post it in a few.
That is the coolest dollhouse ever! Happy birthday little/big F! Cheers – CT
I know, I love it. It’s from Plan Toys, but isn’t available anymore – but they have some newer versions. Also, their eco-friendly home is hysterical.