Meandering Minds: Barney's Birthday Bash

Monday, April 11, 2011

Barney's Birthday Bash

I decided to kick off Jarrett's and my long weekend together with a good dose of kid mania. My friend, Shelly, had texted me the night before to say that her husband had won tickets to Barney's Birthday Bash at Phillips Arena, and asked if Elsa and I would like to join her and her son, Christian, the next morning. Though Jarrett had the day off, I had scheduled massage and chiropractic appointments for him for that morning, so I decided to shove aside the housecleaning I had intended to accomplish, and joined in on the Barney fun instead.

Elsa has not seen much of Barney and, thus, does not really know who he is. However, on the occasions that she has come into contact with him, she is immediately drawn in. He is purple after all. And he sings. I think her first encounter with him was on the cover of a computer game in the Apple Store, and she started calling him "Bunky." That has since ceased.

Elsa seemed pretty excited about the "surprise" that was in store for her (I did not even really try telling her what exactly we were doing since she is not so familiar with the big purple guy), and was wide-eyed as we entered the arena. She was enthralled with the brightly lit signs encircling the seats, and seemed excited to see Barney's picture lit up on stage.

But then the show started. Maybe halfway into the first song, she was saying she was "all done," and that she wanted to go home. I asked her if she wanted to sit in my lap, and that seemed to help out. I sang along with the songs I knew, hoping that might ease her into things. Honestly, the show was a bit more overwhelming than Shelly and I were expecting. There were a lot of flashing lights, and many of the songs were more of the loud, jazzed-up variety rather than the quiet songs you tend to hear on the show. There was an intermission in the middle of it all, which provided a needed break. Although, once we were out of the seating area and in the lounge/restaurant area, Elsa kept going back to the overlook to see if anything was going on onstage. Shelly and Christian stayed up top for most of the last part of the show, but Elsa sat fairly contentedly in my lap. And by the end (of course), she was even getting into it, clapping her hands, getting up and dancing a bit, and helping (in a pretend fashion) Barney blow out his birthday candles at the tailend of the show.

Overall, I'm glad we went, and it seemed like the kids did have fun. But it also reminded me again that perhaps Elsa still is not quite ready for the overstimulation that much of the media today doles out.