Five years. Wow. My precious boy is turning 5. This is the front of his birthday party invitation. Kind of. He was so excited about it, he watched me working on the invitation for a long time. I finally asked him to go play because he kept moving the recliner I was sitting in (Photoshop and track pads are bad enough without someone moving your work area constantly). I can't believe an almost-5-year-old could stay interested in Photoshop that long. But you'll understand when you get your invitation. The back was a lot of fun, and I can honestly say he helped.

I was not trying to go all-out on this invitation, but it turned out nicely. David got me an Easy button when I was working on the M&M one. Keep it simple... I'm trying. But since we're doing this party with Abbey, I don't want to put on too shabby a show. The party part should be easy, but I haven't figured out favors yet.

David has been uncharacteristically involved in the preparation for this one. He's been shopping on eBay, looking for the few Cars diecast characters (cars) that we don't have yet. And he made labels to go inside a new case so that all of the treasured cars have their own place.

See, the case Gabe got for his birthday last year had spaces for 16 cars, and each space had a sticker in it. Mattel was thinking ahead, kind of. Only it turns out they underestimated how many cars people would buy--by a long shot!

Last year, each individually packaged car had a picture on the back of all of the collectible cars. But soon, those pictures were changing and new ones were being added all of the time.

Gabe currently has 31 cars (he got some for his birthday last year, some for Christmas, etc.).

Now he'll be getting several more. David let Carmen "shop" at the "Gabe store" tonight. She picked "Leakless" and the Ferrari. Then, after asking if I thought Paloma would understand the concept, he sneaked Paloma into the "Gabe store". She picked out two "Mones" for him: yellow and hydraulic red.

(I knew she'd get it; this morning she repeated, "Socks for Mason" as we went to get shin guards & socks for him for soccer camp. She told this to the greeter at Walmart and the cashier at Target. Yes, I had to go to both places because I forgot that WALMART only restocks things when they feel like it. They had the shin guards, but not ANY soccer socks, for children or adults. Why, why, why do I EVER go there when I'm in a hurry?)

A couple of months ago, I found two sets of "Movie Moments" cars: the Italian Luigi & Guido as Ferrari fans, and the Mike & Sully set. Gabe was with me at Walmart on this trip, but there was no way I was leaving without them because they were so rare, I didn't dare try to come back later. So I tried to hide them in the cart. Of course, one glimpse of the red packaging gave it away when he poked his nose near the cart. He was giddy. But I told him, try to forget about these so I can give them to you for your birthday. A few weeks later, he said, Mom, I'm still trying to forget about those movie Cars cars.

That's my boy.