Javi’s Nine!

Javier Cash Duffy is NINE! He’s 9! He’s halfway to 18. He has been with us… lived with us… for half the time that he’s required to live with us. That’s just craziness. Like, actually totally mind blowing.

He had quite the birthday celebration! It started the weekend before his birthday when he invited a few friends to a party at Urban Air. I’m not totally a fan of birthday parties, or trampoline parks, but it ended up being great. He chose the place and he chose the time (10AM) because he “didn’t want to wait all day” for his party and turns out — 10AM was the perfect time. There was no one else there and we pretty much had the entire place to ourselves.

As much as I don’t love party places, it’s pretty sweet that they do all the work for you. There’s no set up or clean up and they move you through the party like a well-oiled machine. Javi and everyone else seemed to have so much fun and I was glad he got that experience! We didn’t do a party last year and I think a “friend party” every other year seems like a good compromise since I’d prefer to just stick with family!

His actual birthday fell on a Friday but lucky for him, it was considered a professional development day and he didn’t have school. What a difference from last year as a second grader — when he was thrilled to have school on his birthday because of the hoopla (the birthday pencil, birthday book and birthday announcement over the loud speaker) and now as a third grader — the joy over not having school on his birthday was so apparent. I was happy for him!

He still woke up early — 6AM, and he was at our bed asking about his presents! We’re still absolutely in the instant gratification phase of childhood. 🙂 We had told him he was in control of the day and he could choose (within reason) whatever it was that he wanted to do! So his first stop was IHOP. 🙂

The next stop was to the mall. He loves the mall so much which is so funny because we’ve spent most of his life… not at the mall. I remember going to the mall all the time when I was young and ultimately worked at the mall as a teenager. But since having kids, I think I can count the number of times I’ve been to the mall with them on one hand! But he loves it. We tried our hand at Build A Bear to get the “pay your age” bear. But of course, we got there and he didn’t want that bear, he wanted a Pikachu — despite having multiple Pikachus at home! But there we were, dressing Pikachu in a Harry Potter cloak.

From there, we headed to Dave and Buster’s! He’s been loving arcades and I think he would go every day. He was very lucky he brought Lola and Eva with us because the two of them cleared out the claw machine with their patience and good luck. They ended up getting so many tickets — like thousands — and then generously split them all so they could all get useless toys from the little arcade shop.

After IHOP, the mall, Build a Bear and Dave and Buster’s — Sean and I were exhausted — but he was still ready to go! So we dropped off the others with my parents and Sean and I took Javi to the movies. He wanted to see Beetlejuice 2 (not my favorite) so that’s what we saw. It was really fun to spend time with just him since that never happens!

And his birthday kept going! We had to pause the celebrations for a brief intermission of gymnastics for Eva and cheer for Lola but as soon as everyone was back at home, he chose Dairy Queen for dinner, and and an ice cream cake for dessert!

He was so happy the whole day and I’m so glad he got his “yes” day!

Happy Birthday, Javi!