Like most other five-year-olds, Alexandra “Alex” Greenberg was excited about her birthday party and all its festivities: a piñata, balloon races, and activity stations where her friends could decorate cupcakes, string beads, make decorative placemats and create a “happy birthday” bouquet of popsicle-stick flowers. She was also excited about where she was having her party – Village Shalom.

Alex shows off the “happy birthday bouquet” that she and her friends created at her party. The bouquet will remain at Village Shalom for residents to enjoy on their birthdays.

Not many preschoolers have their birthday parties at a retirement community, but Alex is not your typical five-year-old. For her, birthdays are about giving rather than receiving. “I decided I want to help people,” Alex said. In fact, her party invitation requested that her friends make donations to Village Shalom instead of bringing birthday presents for her.

“We try to do a mitzvah on our birthdays,” explained her mother, Debbie Greenberg. That means that the Greenberg family – Debbie and Greg, and their daughters Jessica and Alex – each find a way to do a good deed when birthday time comes. For example, Jessica recently celebrated her 12^th birthday by inviting her friends to join her at a local animal shelter to clean the cages.

For Alex, Village Shalom was a natural choice as a party venue. She has been a regular visitor there for more than a year as part of the monthly “Moms & Munchkins Mitzvah Moments” playgroup her mother organized. Debbie had discovered the Little Village area at Village Shalom – a playroom filled with toys and play equipment for young children – and decided it would be nice to provide a regular opportunity for moms and kids to share some time with one another and with Village Shalom residents. The group meets the first Monday of every month.

Moms & Munchkins has become such an important part of Alex’s life, Debbie related, that “every Monday after her piano lesson, Alex asks, ‘Is this the week we get to go to Village Shalom?’ Her piano teacher has heard her talk about it so much that now [the teacher] is thinking of having a recital there.”

With Village Shalom being such a friendly, familiar place for Alex, it is only natural that she has befriended a number of Village Shalom residents. She made certain that they were invited to her birthday party, along with about a dozen of her preschool friends. It made for a truly intergenerational celebration that offered something fun for everyone.

What did Alex enjoy most about her party? “The piñata,” she said unequivocally, “because my daddy gave me extra candy.”

But even extra candy didn’t sidetrack Alex from the more important meaning of her party: “I was helping make the people who live [at Village Shalom] feel better,” she added. “It makes the older people happy when the kids come.”