Pre-Party...

If I learned anything in college, it was that the pre-party is just as (if not more) important than the actual party. 

(I learned other things, too, Mom and Dad. This is just one of those life skills things). 

Landry's birthday falls during Spring Break which means that her party is hit or miss with friends. This year we decided to avoid that all together and celebrated two weeks early! I picked a car load of giggly girls up on Friday afternoon and away we went for the celebration!

The Munson crew plus another pre-k friend met us at Altitude College Station and we had the place to ourselves for the next hour and a half.

(Quick unsolicited plug for Altitude - they let me purchase two frequent jumper cards and use them for 10 kids which then meant I got two free hours to use at another time. They also let us jump until 5pm even though we paid a little after 3:30pm. They win the day!)

I couldn't really keep up with them, they were all literally jumping all over the place and were barely still long enough to get any actual pictures. 

I eventually forced them to pose and I melted. 

Not pictured: Gabe and Radley rolling their eyes at all the girls

Millie has obviously been in our lives since before she was born and Claire is a sweet friend from preschool that Landry insisted meet us there because she "misses her so much!"

Altitude also has an section of "rock climbing" that the kids love - I was pretty darn impressed with how high they made it!

Ryan met us at Altitude because although Myrtle can do lots and lots of things, she can't fit 11 people safely inside. We headed home and arrived precisely as pizza was being delivered. We had a happy crew!

They ate, ziplined, gymnastic"ed", chased, pretended, played and then finally sat down to eat some cake!

The smile on her face while her friends sang happy birthday is a sweet little moment that I don't ever want to forget!

Then we moved on to what everyone was waiting for... 

PRESENTS!

She made sure to give every single friend a big ginormous hug after each gift she opened. I don't know if she's really every been so happy... and this was no Pinterest worthy party. This was a little girl, surrounded by her friends, feeling loved and celebrated big. No fancy theme, no big decorations - I didn't even create invitations, I just emailed parents. But this day was exactly what she wanted and I am so glad that she felt all the love that she deserves. 

She ended with a giant pallet, falling asleep to her bestest friends and having the sweetest not-quite-six-year-old dreams you can have. 

Happy pre-birthday, Landry! May you always feel this loved and celebrated!