This year for Gabe's birthday celebration we are taking him and some pals to play paintball.
By "we" I mean I'm going along and taking photos while Matt and the boys all pelt each other with paintballs and get disastrously muddy and wet.
Because we are knee deep in baseball, the dates we are available to play paintball are limited to Sundays. I wouldn't normally plan a birthday party on a Sunday but options are limited. We picked a date and hoped for the best.
The plan is for us to pick up all the pals and then head out to the paintball fields. Since it is a Sunday, and a Sunday during football season, I wanted to increase the chances of the kids coming by offering to give everyone a ride to the fields.
We are waiting on one more response but at this point our pick up list involves picking up 2 of the 3 kiddos at different churches in town. I'm a little amused by this. We have the birthday party van going from church to church to pick up party goers.
I'm also curious.... why is anyone at church at 1pm. Geez. What about Sunday naps and football?
One of the kids is getting picked up AND returned to church. I need to look into this church. People stay there all day? Is there food? Are they teaching and singing the whole time? Do they get to wear comfy pants? The last is really the biggest question.
I'm really excited for this little adventure for Gabe. He has wanted to play paintball for a long time and has never had the chance. I'm also excited for this "party" because it is his first real birthday party with school friends. There are a lot of reasons behind this: a September birthday is pretty early to establish friends you want to invite over for a weekend party when you are new to the school. Unfortunately, Gabe has started a new school just a few weeks before his birthday 3 times. He also just isn't my really social guy. He has friends at school but he has struggled with really accepting people for who they are, including the good, bad and ugly. He tends to get irritated with people or easily offended and then friends are just classmates. He doesn't have "play dates" with other kids because most of his classmates are busy, just like us. Sports, instruments, church, whatever .... time for inviting a friend over to hang out has slipped away.
So this is a big birthday for Gabe. I'm praying that he and his buddies have a great time. The weather is kind to us, and some deeper relationships are built as they spend the day together outside of school.
I'm super relived that his friends could come because I really didn't want to be guilted into getting my butt beat up playing paintball.
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