Build-a-Bear Party!

Ian's friend Brian had his birthday party last Saturday at the Build-a-Bear in the mall. I told Ian that Brian's party would have lots of teddy bears and Ian's party would have lots of dinosaurs, so he was pretty excited.

The Build-a-Bear is quite chaotic because it's in the mall, the party is not separate from the rest of the store, and the stuffing machines are VERY LOUD. But the kids don't seem to mind. So first they got to pick a bear. The choices were a beige bear and a chocolate brown bear. When it was Ian's turn, he of course pointed to another section (more expensive, of course) and said, "I want the white one." No, you can either have the beige or the brown. So he picked the beige (points to Ian on this one - no tantrum, no arguing). Then we had to go over to the stuffing machine where the kids sat in a circle and passed around a toy stuffed cupcake. Brian had his bear stuffed first. When the machine stopped, whoever had the cupcake would get his/her bear filled. Ian sat next to his little friend Thomas, who we haven't seen since Ian moved upstairs. We had to pick a name for the bear and Ian isn't very good at that yet. Neither were some of the other kids, apparently. One named hers "Bear" and another one named his bear after himself. Ian seemed to be drawing a blank, so I suggested Steve or Joe (as in Steve or Joe from "Blue's Clues"). Steve was emphatically chosen as the name for the bear. Ian's bear got stuffed (he didn't want to step on the pedal to make the machine work) and he was one of the last ones, so as soon as everyone was finished, an assortment of outfits were laid out. The birthday boy is obsessed with superheroes, so there were a lot of Spiderman outfits. That caught Ian's eye at first. "I want Spiderman!" So did a lot of other kids, so our party host had to get another Spiderman outfit especially for Ian. When we got it, Ian inspected it and declared, "I don't want that. It's too scary." The Spiderman outfit came complete with a mask for the bear with silver eye patches, so yes, I would have to agree that it was a little scary. Luckily, there was an outfit that had dinosaurs on it, so Ian chose that. Steve Bear was dressed in a tank top and shorts with dinosaurs on them. Very cool. After all the bears were done, the kids marched around the store and then we went up to the food court for pizza and cake. Once again, Ian skipped the cupcakes, but he did take the toy car that was on top of the cupcake. He insisted on re-parking the car on top of the cupcake (i.e., stuck it back into the icing) each time I cleaned it off. I think he had a good time. And he brought Steve Bear to school practically every day this week and has slept with him every night.

Here's Ian with his Steve Bear and his friend Thomas: