Birthday parties

Just a random thought (rant?), since I've been seeing so much about this on the neighborhood list serves asking about venues, activites, bouncy houses, who to hire, etc., for young childrens birthday parties.

Since when do birthday parties have to be such a big deal???
What ever happened to just having a birthday cake, make your own goodie bags, a craft of some sort, and some fun like treasure hunts, and playing outside? 
Since when did it become a day for spending more, doing more, inviting more, and a party for adults?   
The rule in our house has always been as follows:

• No parties with friends/kids other than family until in kindergarten
• you may have the number of kids for the age you are turning
• no meals - just cake and ice cream - parties are either before lunch or after lunch and before dinner
• we don't do activities until older - activities like bowling or movie
• no sleep overs

Some of our party ideas/themes that we did, at home, are:
and sometimes we did the same theme for 2 years in a row or we re-used the theme for another child.  

• Bugs - bug stickers, make bug catchers, find bug treasure hunt, toss the bug games, bug books,
• Peter Pan - pin the hook on Hook, shoot off stomp rockets, treasure hunt
• Pirates - dress up, build a pirate ship w/ legos, create pirate flags, treasure hunt, make a spy glass
• X Games - all the outdoor games - biking, inline skating, street hockey, pinata,
• trains - build trains, color trains, conductor hats, lantern goodie bags
• Knights - make a knight from boxes, tubes, etc. and paint, play sword fights w/ nerf swords

I'm all for the good old fashioned fun that a small birthday party entails and I just don't get the "bigger is better" attitude. 

Alexandria Playgroups

The following playgroups are offered in the City of Alexandria.
The playgroups are for children age birth to age 4. 
These playgroups meet throughout the year but DO NOT meet during the month of August.

The playgroups are FREE and a few require pre-registration. 

These Playgroups allow you to:

• Meet other parents
• Learn about Resources in Alexandria
• Guide your child’s play with other children
• Provide structured socialization for your child

Mondays

• 11:15am – 12:15pm, Tower 2000 Building, 5800 Quantrell Avenue

     ** call to register, 703-746-6029

Tuesdays

• Play to Learn Playgroup: 10 am – 11:30 am, The Durant Center, 1605 Cameron Street

** during June and July this group will meet at the Head Start Building located at N. West Street and Cameron St.  

Wednesdays

•  Infant Toddler Connection:  10:00 am – 11:30 am, Nannie Lee Rec Center, 1108 Jefferson Street, ** call to register 703-746-3358

  

• 10:15 – 11:15 am, Beatley Central Library, 5005 Duke Street,  ** call to register  703-746-6015

Thursdays

• Play, Learn, Grow Together Playgroup, 10:00 am – 11:30 am, The Center for Alexandria’s Children, 1900 N. Beauregard Street

Fridays

• Chiquitos Playgroup – conducted in Spanish, 10:00 am – 11:30 am, Community Lodgings Family Learning Center, 607 Notabene Drive

• Infant Toddler Connection, 10:30 am – 12:00 pm, Cora Kelly Recreation Center,  25 W Reed Street

Listen to Audio Books on Your Next Car Ride

As you prepare for a long car trip or just need to get your kids off the television, video games or computer, there is a way to enjoy books without ever going to the library.  Books on tape can be downloaded right onto your laptop, iPod, iPhone or other listening device, through OverDrive, a global eBook and audiobook distributor.   

Here’s how it works: 

Go to your local library’s web site, http://www.alexandria.lib.va.us/
From the menu click on Overdrive, it should be on the main page and could be labeled audio books or e books. 
Download the OverDrive program onto your computer.  (The overdrive system uses the Microsoft® Windows Media Audio format)

Then begin searching for books you’d like to listen to and place them in your “cart”. 
**note - not all books or current releases are available on this system, so you will need to search for books under the overdrive program and NOT from the library’s card catalogue. 
 
You can check out as many as 10 titles at a time.
When you check out, you select how long you’d like to have the book(s), 7, 14 or 21 days. 
 If the book you’d like isn’t available, place a hold on it and you’ll be notified via e mail when your book becomes available.

Upon checking out, the selected title(s) download to your computer.
Then, if you want, you can transfer it to your particular mobile device. 
When your time with the book has elapsed, the title will simply "disappear" from your device.  No need to worry about overdue charges or trips to the library.
And if you need to more time because you haven’t finished listening to it, simply go into the system to renew it.    

Did you know that you can belong to multiple library systems?  You can get a free library card from most local jurisdictions - DC, Fairfax, Arlington and Alexandria.  So if one library system doesn’t have a particular book you’d like, check out another system. 

The best part is that this service, as with all other library services, is FREE.
But an even better feature is that you can use this service whenever it’s convenient for you, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. 

I use this program/system all time, making sure we always have an audio book on someone’s iPod for car rides or for down time. My oldest uses this service to listen to English/Literature books throughout the school year.  And my younger child uses it for pleasure reading (listening). He has dyslexia and reading is extremely difficult for him. His comprehension level is much higher than his fluency, so ebooks allows him to "get" books that are of interest to him and on his comprehension level.