Alms-Giving and Birthday Fun

For yesterday's Lenten task, the girls were told to reflect upon how many toys they have and how fortunate they are to have so many things.  They then got to choose an amount of money from their piggy banks to give as a donation of some sort.  Julia willingly brought down a dollar from her piggy bank, while Madeleine got a little too caught up in the fun of dumping the coins from her piggy bank and then putting them, one by one, through the slot back INTO the piggy bank.  In fact, she decided that the activity was SO much fun that she didn't want to give away anything.  She needed it for her game of dumping and depositing.  So, in the true spirit of Christianity, Julia sneakily snagged one of Madeleine's quarters off of the dining room floor and gave it to me to put in our donation envelope.  Now THAT is how we get it done.

I guess Julia was really into the alms-giving thing, because she came up with a fantastic idea last night as she sipped the last of the water from her little Poland Spring bottle.  "Mom?  You know how, like, Auntie Shannon and Auntie Caitlyn don't have any MONEY?  Well, since I sent Auntie Shannon the LAST present I made, I thought that, when I'm done drinking this water, I'm gonna decorate the water bottle like an EASTER EGG, and I'll go get one of the coins from my piggy bank and WRAP it, and send it to Auntie Caitlyn so she can have some MONEY!"

I am certain that there is nothing more in this world that Auntie Caitlyn wants to receive in the mail than a used water bottle that my sick, raspy-breath, bronchial spasming child has been drinking from.  I mean, she didn't even NEED to sweeten the pot by decorating it as an Easter egg, but she went ahead and did it anyway:

Her heart full of generosity, Julia went and extracted a quarter from her piggy bank and wrapped it in wrapping paper, ready to send her alms off to Auntie Caitlyn.  One day Caitlyn can write her memoir of her life as a struggling graduate student, and how her fortune took a turn the day she received a twenty-five cent piece in the mail from her niece, therefore ensuring her path towards financial security and making ALL of her dreams come true.

In other news, this afternoon we got to attend Quinn's birthday party, which was a lot of fun.  Since Quinn's mommy is a dear friend of Ethan & I, there was no way we could refrain from letting her know what Madeleine and I had chosen.

ME: Madeleine, can you tell Quinn's mommy what we got for his present?
MADELEINE: Um, we got him Star Whores!

One of the highlights of the party was the face painting.  Julia was initially leaning towards getting her face painted as a bunny, but even though she really loves bunnys, she decided to go with her other love and get a wall:

Madeleine, of course, wanted her face painted like Simba:

She was so absolutely enthralled with her Simba face that she felt the need to stand by the vertical mirror that Quinn's mom had propped up on the kitchen counter.  Staring intently at her own reflection, Madeleine was completely oblivious to the fact that she accidentally knocked into the mirror, causing it to topple over and crack her right on the top of her head.  Quinn's mom immediately ran over to make sure Madeleine was okay, kissing the top of Madeleine's head and asking her repeatedly if she was hurt.

MADELEINE: Is...is...is...is...is there ANOTHER MIRROR I can look in?

Yep.  She could care less about the blow to the head.  All she wanted was to continue admiring her new lion identity.

While she held strong over the head conking, Madeleine couldn't quite hold herself together as well as the party came to a close.  After she had her coat on and had possession of her balloon and goody bag, I suggested she go find Quinn and give him a hug and say "happy birthday."

Then I got into a discussion with other moms and I forgot what I had sent her off to do.

About ten minutes later, Madeleine wandered over to me, her face crumpling into sorrow.

ME: Madeleine, honey?  What's wrong?  What happened?
MADELEINE: (bursting into tears) I couldn't find QUINN!

It turns out Quinn was upstairs in the playroom, and Madeleine had wandered the entire downstairs looking for him to no avail.  Luckily, the other grown-ups were able to call him down quickly, and Madeleine was able to give her hug and birthday message before falling completely to shreds.

The party was definitely a hit for kids and grown-ups alike.  Seeing as the last birthday party we attended there was spent with Julia sobbing into my chest and staining my white shirt with her face-paint all because Jovina wasn't able to abandon the rest of her guests and go play "Mean Barbie" up in the play-room with Julia, I was especially pleased to hear Julia's reaction to this event.

ME: So did you girls have fun?
JULIA: I totally had fun!

Mission accomplished!