The Birthday Season

We seem to have entered the birthday season around here. We've been to several parties of late and have several more penciled in on our calendar, the most important of which is little Mae Mae's party. Today is her 4th birthday, and this weekend we'll celebrate with some family in Urbana.

With birthday season comes birthday present dilemma. What's a parent in the 21st Century to do? All of this gift buying is causing me a case of mild anxiety. Add your run-of-the-mill birthday present buying guidelines to the fact that these are parties for Waldorf School kids, and what you have here is a pure dilemma, under whose pressure I buckle like a baby every time. After dozens of trips to the toy store over the course of the last 6 years, I have come up with a list of unspoken but generally agreed upon rules:

1) The present must be pleasing to both the giver (Bela),  the receiver (the list seems to be never-ending), and the other party attendees.  The more oooohs and aaaaaahs from the mouths of the little girls and boys, the higher the value of the present in Bela's eyes.
2) Additionally, the present must be pleasing to the parents of the receiver.
3) It must be responsibly made and constructed with quality, non hazardous materials - preferably in the United States.
4) It must not contain too many small pieces.
5) It must make life easier and not harder on the parents of the birthday girl or boy.
6). It must be age appropriate and suitable for open ended play,
7) not require batteries,
8) and stimulate intellectually without seeming too overtly educational.
9)  It must not perpetuate stereotypes (no pink princessy stuff for girls, no guns or random army paraphernalia for boys)
10) And it must be original, creative, and unique. I.e, they don't already have it, no one else is giving it, and it is preferably (in my opinion) homemade.

So, you can see my dilemma. When I walk into our local toy store with Bela, she immediately violates all rules with the exception of rule number 1. She'll pick out a perfectly cute princess make-up set that both she and the birthday girl would probably love, and then I step in with ant farm and she rolls her eyes. When she finally agrees on the ant farm, I notice it is made in China and you have to send out for the ants. (Violation of rules 1, 2, 3, and 5).

Birthday parties - For Bela they are celebratory occasions of pure joy. For me, a killer headache. It shouldn't be this hard, I should send her in the store with $20 and let her pick whatever she wants. The fact that I don't highlights the absence of rule number 11: The present must make ME look good, too.

So it shouldn't have surprised me when I found myself in the middle of a dilemma while purchasing a present for my very own baby girl.

Asking Mae what she wanted didn't help. She described an elaborate present that sounded a lot like our backyard: I want a small patch of grass with some flowers and vegetables growing and a table for a picnic. I want a picnic basket and some food and a blanket, and some birdies and some stairs leading up to our house. We were seriously getting nowhere.

On a trip to Target to buy a very high tech fan to make our 95 degree apartment more bearable, she fell in love with a present that violated rules 1-11.

When she saw this $25 pink piece of plastic she fell in love. She stared at it, she smiled, she pushed its button and listened to it say asinine things like "I can fly; I'm so pretty; Don't you love me?" * She pleaded and she begged and she shook with excitement. Like all parents it warms my heart to make her happy, and so after some foot shuffling and some uncomfortable silence, I said that maybe, possibly, she would get this some day for her birthday.

That night she told Chris all about it. She also told him she would be getting it this year for her birthday and that she was so excited oh thank you Mom, thank you Mom, thank you Mom.

Yesterday, I went back to Target. I stood in the toy store aisle for seemingly forever, I picked it up. I put it down. I went so far as to carry the box to the cashier, but as she scanned my gum and my sunscreen and my beach bag, I couldn't let go of Princess Celestia. I couldn't do it. I couldn't spend $25 on a box of pink junk that lit up and talked and moved its wings. I told the woman I changed my mind, and last night after dinner, over ice cream, I told Mae I didn't think it was a good present. I tried to explain the present rules, I told her it would break. I told her it would constantly run out of batteries. I told her that in the long run she would get little satisfaction out of the thing. And I held my breath.

She smiled and said, O.K,, Mom. And this morning as she opened her Harp from Grandpa and Nancy, her sticker books and hair accessories from Grandma Lou and Paunkie, and her stack of coloring books from Mom and Dad, she squealed with delight.

* Princess Celestia does not actually say these things. Her statements were harmless dribble, but this is how I remember it.