Operation Surprise the Boy on his Birthday

Since he dubbed today "The Best Birthday, EVER!" I'll say we were successful.

A few weeks ago Rehm announced that he wanted to open his junior brokerage account on his birthday!  He thought that would be "the coolest thing ever!"  Of course, his birthday was a school day, so he assumed that it wasn't going to be an option.  Michael told him that if Rehm helped fill out the forms, Michael would take them in on his birthday and open the account for him.  Rehm was completely fine with that.

Rehm filling out his brokerage account forms

After breakfast, Rehm opened gifts from the family.  His sisters had all made him gifts.  They had basically found things in their rooms they thought he would like and wrapped them up and made him cards.  He did such a great job of appreciating their gifts.  I was very proud of him.  His sisters did a great job of picking things that followed Rehm's interests.  They also game him a Chuy's T-shirt that had a Hunger Games theme.  He decided, at my suggestion, to change shirts so he could wear it to school.

He went on to open his gift from Michael and I as we didn't know of any other time that day the whole family would be in the same place.  It was the Skylander starter kit for the Wii. He was very pleased.

We sent him off to school thinking he was going to just have a normal day at school and that I would bring goodies for his class toward the end of the day.  What Rehm didn't know, was that we had a better idea.  Due to coincidence it happened that Rehm was going to be having a mostly review day at school on his actual birthday.  Michael and I decided he could miss part of the day.

We even had to pretend to pack his lunch.  His lunch box contained an empty ziploc container, a juice box and a note from us, just in case he actually opened his lunch box.



I arrived at school at 9:30 to pick him up.  He walked in the office saw me and asked, "So what did I do?" in a resigned voice.  I told him I was picking him up for an appointment.  He looked really confused and asked if it was to go get his hearing checked.  I explained that he had a 10:00 appointment to set up his brokerage account.  He was stunned.  It was too cute.  I told the office staff we would be back after lunch.

In the car he called Cici so she could wish him a  happy birthday.  He wanted to know what time he would be back at school because his teacher had told the class they could work on the 5th grade school iPads  after lunch if they behaved themselves for the morning.  I assured him he would not be upset if he ended up missing the iPad time.

We set up the brokerage account.  Our account manager was great with him.  He made a point to talk to Rehm, ask him questions and explain some things about investing to him.  It was great and made Rehm feel very grown up.The account manager wanted to know what else Rehm was going to do to celebrate his birthday?  I spoke up and said, "What Rehm doesn't know yet is that when we leave here we are taking him to see The Hunger Games."  I thought Rehm was going to fall out of his chair he was so shocked.  He never in a million years expected his parents to let him miss school to go to a movie! And, he wasn't sure we were going to let him see this movie.

Waiting for the movie to start

He enjoyed the movie and thought they movie makers did a great job staying true to the book.  After the movie I took him back to school for the last hour of the school day. 

After school he came home and played Skylanders for a while - he really likes it but would like more Skylander characters.  Then we had a quick dinner and sent him off to scouts.

We did not have cake or cupcakes on his birthday simply because he wants Gigi's cupcakes and thinks their Friday menu sounds the best.  We will finish celebrating on Friday.  Which is a good thing as I realized last night while trying to fall asleep that we never sang Happy Birthday to him.
I think he is also planning to invite a couple of friends over in a couple of weeks for a sleepover.  I guess we need to get that planned...

Jenn - Posted from my iPhone