Jack Turns Three!

Jack turned three last weekend! I was especially happy to share it with him since I was in Iraq last year when he turned two and had to miss his first birthday due to an emergency at work. Granted, his first and second birthdays were pretty sedate affairs (only our neighbors participated). So my attractive wife and I decided to pull out the stops for birthday number three and initiate Jack (and ourselves) to the wonders of Chuck E. Cheese's.

We invited Jack's cousins and his day care playmate, Jay who is a couple of months younger than Jack. Plus some adult friends who we knew could handle it including neighbors Dewey and Day-Day, some friends from work and friends from my bachelor days.

Everything was highly scripted. We got to have "playtime" for forty-five minutes, each child getting a number of complimentary tokens for the numerous games. After playtime, were called back to the birthday table where we ate pizza. Then, Mr. Cheese made a special appearance for our party (and four other simultaneous celebrations) amongst much singing and dancing.

Jack got his very own chocolate cake with three candles. It was very festive. After singing "Happy Birthday" Jack bent over to blow out the candles and ended up slobbering all over the cake. (I don't think anyone but me saw that.)

Next, we cut up the cake and folks dug in. It was very entertaining watching Jack and Jay dissecting their respective pieces of cake. They both were the model of determination.


Next, Jack began opening presents. He made out like a bandit. The most entertaining gift bag, from Victoria's Secret, came from two friends from work.

We were having a ball when my attractive wife grabbed my attention and said, "We have six minutes to clear the tables." Huh? Apparently, our festive celebration had run its (paid) course and we were being shuffled off to a booth in the play area where we could continue our party. Where did the time go?

Jack and Jay took the opportunity to burn off their respective sugar highs in the playground area. In addition to slides, this venue featured "tubes" which spanned the whole play area. Jack disappeared into them and I watched him from the ground level. He went all the way around but came down crying after some kid apparently hit his face with their shoes. After a big hug and some kissing on the forehead, he was back at it. Still, that episodes seems to lends some credence to the fact that the police often are called to these establishments to break up fights between grown ups.

Jack and Jay next tried out some of the more terrestrial slides over and over again.

Flush with tokens, Jack got to try a number of the attractions like the "Jett Rider" which simulates riding a roller coaster. The ride features a video monitor for other kids to see who's riding.

Jack reacquainted himself with an ersatz Mr. Cheese on a car ride. Jack seemed to enjoy putting the tokens in the respective slots of the various rides than the rides themselves. Jack would periodically turn to me and say, "money?" Somehow, I don't think rewarding this type of activity bodes well for the future.

The party started at 1100 and we didn't' end up leaving until well after 1400. Jack had a blast.