Chuck E Cheese Birthday Party

On Sunday, June 10, the older two boys & I headed to Aunt Jen's house for Daniel's birthday party. She had invited Joshua along with their next-door neighbor Nathan and another boy that was Daniel's friend from preschool to Chuck E Cheese that afternoon, but the other friend couldn't make it last minute. I told her I would go along and help watch the kiddos, but I wanted to bring Caleb along (bringing some of our own tokens) so Shawn could get some work done and she said that was fine. So, we drove together in her minivan. The kids were super excited!

While Jen ordered and split up the tokens, I took a picture of all the boys together. Nathan was in Joshua's preschool class and will also be in his kindergarten class, we just learned. :) :) :) Daniel will have the same teacher, but he'll be heading to afternoon kindergarten while Joshua will be in Mrs. Vogt's morning class.

The boys had a blast that day. I also had fun watching them, especially without carrying dear little Ryan around with us. I could concentrate on what they were doing.

Being a "frugal" mom, I asked them to do their activities one at a time most of the afternoon. They watched each other play and extended their time there.

I was also impressed that Chuck E. Cheese (which Caleb now calls "PBS Kids") has brought in more games than when we were last there a few years ago. None of the machines were broken, either, and the new games were fun. What the boys were playing in the above picture was the bubbles game, where you pop the bubbles and earn tickets for the number you get. I combined my two kids' tickets so they got an even number of prizes at the end. Some day that may not work, but for now, it makes sense for us.

Joshua especially loves the airplane/boat game that he's playing in the above picture. He also loves the car racing games on this "bigger kid" side. Caleb's still a little young for most of the games on the bigger side, but he had a blast on the smaller kiddo area.

For example, here he was riding a horse. I was impressed by our visit that day. All games are one token (which roughly equals .25). And I think Jen spent something like $15 and we were there for two hours or so and had plenty of fun!

Toward the end of our time there, Joshua & Daniel discovered the joy of playing air hockey together, and they played almost the rest of our time. They were having a blast! Jen & I remembered how much we used to enjoy air hockey when we were younger, too. :) :) :)

 In the mean time, I followed Caleb & Nathan around to see what they were interested in. Here they are riding the pink frog carriage. FUN!

And I loved that the screen on the basketball game showed them what they looked like as they shot baskets. We love our hoops!

Caleb loves this "hungry dog" game. He could have played it all day! When we were done, I think we had something like 180 tickets that we fed into the counter and gave to the girl. That won them each a small cheap little plastic dinosaur and a pack of smarties. Perfect!

The rides that they also enjoy don't "earn" tickets, but they were still having fun! Gotta love the pink carriage.

And Caleb had no fear of the rides unlike his older brother at this age. He wanted to do everything while we were there. I think we did do a majority of the games!

When we left, Joshua went back to Aunt Jen's for pizza as part of the original birthday crew, and we headed home to feed Caleb & Ryan with Daddy. Then I went back to pick up Joshua from the party and saw the other folks who had arrived for cake & ice cream. The Bean had had a fun time! Thanks for inviting us, Aunt Jen! And happy 5th birthday, Daniel!