Snubbed 5-Year-Old Gets Birthday Party She’ll Never Forget
When none of 5-year-old Taliyah Sassmannshausen’s guests showed up at her birthday party on Saturday, her mom invited the whole town and helped her little girl make 75 new friends. (Photo: Facebook/Lauren Sassmannshausen)
The snacks were set out, an inflatable pool was ready to be used, and Taliyah Sassmannshausen was raring to celebrate. Only trouble was, not a single one of the 5-year-old’s 30 guests who’d RSVP’d yes to attending her birthday party on Saturday in Spring Hill, Tenn., was anywhere to be seen.
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“She kept asking me when her friends would be there and I kept saying, ‘They’re coming, baby,’” the girl’s mother, Lauren Sassmannshausen, told WKRN. After an hour of waiting in the yard where they held the bash, at Taliyah’s grandmother’s home, Lauren took matters into her own hands and invited anyone and everyone in the area to join the party with a post on the Facebook community page “I heart spring hill - TN ya’ll.”
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“It is seriously breaking my heart,” the mom wrote to the 2,500-member group on Aug. 15. “We have PLENTY of food and drinks. We don’t care about presents, she just wants friends. … We have a huge inflatable water slide and pool for all the kids to play in. PLEASEEEE come have fun!”
The mother, who was unavailable for immediate comment to Yahoo Parenting, had sent out reminders a week prior and says, “Everybody was like, ‘Yes, we’re still coming.’” So, she admitted to WKRN, when zero kids came, “I was just in tears. I never thought that many people would not show up.” But almost immediately after she put out her call on social media, neighbors in the town, located 30 miles south of Nashville, answered. The first new guests rolled in just 10 minutes after she posted, and by day’s end, more than 75 people rallied to show little Tallie, as she’s nicknamed, their support.
“Never in my life thought a community would pull together like they did today,” Lauren marveled on Facebook later that afternoon. In gratitude for all the support, the Mini Me Bowtique accessories designer gushed, “I thank you all so very much…You all went above and beyond to make my baby girls birthday a very special one.”
Taliyah, for her part, took the joy that the strangers brought as a gift in itself. “Every time she met someone, she was like, ‘You’re my new best friend,’” her father, Jeffery, told WKRN. “She had fun with everyone.”
As did her mom, who said, “It just made my heart melt how people who don’t even know us care so much to make her birthday memorable.”
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