WFMW Birthday Edition

When I first heard that Rocks in My Dryer was doing a birthday edition of Works for Me Wednesday, I didn't think I had any good birthday ideas, except get my sister to make the cake because she makes really interesting cakes for the kids birthdays. They are really cool looking and are fun. She makes some odd recipes for the cake part and sometimes they don't seem all that kid friendly. What happened to chocolate and white as kid birthday staples? I digress. As I thought more, I realized that I have a very inexpensive way to get gifts for those parties the kids are invited to. We have a great dollar store in town, Deals. It is a chain I think. When we have to find a gift for a birthday, I take the girls in there. The get to pick out several fun things for the special person and I put them in a gift bag. For younger kids, sometimes the number of gifts is the big deal rather than the money spent, and Deals has some nice things for a dollar a piece. I can usually find some really nice toys and trinkets for between $5 and $10. If the party has a theme, I will try to get gifts around the theme or add a small theme related item to the stash. Last time, Je was invited to a party for a boy in her preschool class that we don't know very well. I think the whole class was invited. One of Je's friends is the boy's aunt (dad was married before) and Je wanted to go see her friend at the party. The day before we made a trip to Deals, and bought a car, ball, an action figure, and a plane kit. I added a book I found based on the movie Cars, the party's theme, and the whole thing was pretty economical yet fun. This is especially good when you don't know the child very well and don't know what would be a great gift, and when you want to be thrifty. It works for me.