By Lindsay Tice,Staff Writer

AUBURN – For her birthday, Emily Beaulieu got the key to the city.

Top business leaders sang “Happy Birthday” to her. Mayor Normand Guay said he was honored to meet her. News people followed her with cameras.

But at the Book Burrow on Monday, the newly minted 7-year-old took it all in stride. It was the tabletop covered in toys that she couldn’t believe.

They were all hers to give away to children in need.

“You know what? I think we stocked them up pretty good!” she exclaimed.

Emily, a bubbly Litchfield home-schooler often involved in charity work, made headlines earlier this month when she decided to forego birthday presents so other children could have toys.

She had gotten so much for Christmas, she said, that she didn’t want anything else for her Jan. 22 birthday.

She asked birthday party guests to bring toys to donate to the Catholic Charities Toy Box, a program that gives toys to young fire victims. With her mother’s help, she added a toy drive at a Lewiston nursing home, at KB Toys and at the Book Burrow.

Emily’s pie-in-the-sky goal: 200 toys.

She got 362.

“It’s the best birthday I’ve ever had,” Emily told her mother.

On Saturday, party guests brought so many toys to Emily’s home that they overflowed the large box set up for the occasion. On Monday morning, Emily and her family made the rounds at her toy drive locations, adding bag after bag of toys.

By the time they reached the Book Burrow, the family van was so filled that Emily and her brothers barely had room to move. Inside the bookstore, more puzzles, games and stuffed animals were waiting. And, in a surprise, so were the mayor, local business leaders and news people.

Guay presented Emily a heavy brass key to the city. “That means I’m the one who’s fortunate to meet you. That’s how special you are.”

Normally chatty, Emily shyly stuck to “Thank you.”

It was the second time in two days that she’d been the center of attention. On Sunday, Disney On Ice officials honored her during their afternoon show in Portland.

But while she ate birthday cake at the Book Burrow – also part of the surprise – Emily talked more about donated toys than all the attention.

“I think we’re getting some good stuff,” she said.

With help from her two older brothers, she packed up the toys, adding three bags and a large stuffed giraffe to the pile. Tim Vrabel, a Bangor Savings Bank business officer, watched and talked about starting a fund in Emily’s name “in case she wants to continue with this.”

For Emily, there was no uncertainty about continuing. She plans to do it all over again for her eighth birthday.

“Every time a house burns down a toy goes and the (donation) pile gets lower and lower and lower,” she said. “They need to stock up.”