Hi,
Here's a great idea for you, one that I highly recommend, I did this one for my own son and he turned 8 this year, but its great for any birthday, take him to Build a Bear Workshop out at FireWheel in Garland and let him make his own "friend". They have lots of different animals to choose from with a lot of different costumes to dress them and more accessories too. The staff there is great and supervises the whole thing. You can even put sound in your friend with a lot of different sounds, and they espeically cater to "birthday" kids, making a really big deal of the whole thing, something they will not forget, and then they have a very "special" friend that they created. It even comes with a birth certificate and they get you signed up for all kinds of special deals later on. When we went the last time, they had sent us a coupon for $5.00 off and he sure did come in handy. And while we were there, they gave us another coupon for $3.00 for next time. It really is a very neat place, not just for girls, because they have costumes like Spiderman, Superman (which my son got), and right now, you can make "Cody" from Surf's Up (which is what we made here recently). Trust me, its a lot of fun for the child and grown-up too. Good Luck with your birthday and have lots of fun..............