The party went well, as far as the children were concerned. The adults were more than stressed, but given that the kids liked it, I call it a win, all 'round. (Something about having four adults -- we've gotten soft, I expect, from the ability to lean on each other. Two-parent households, not to mention single-parent households, have birthday parties every year. Why do we find it so stressful?)
In the end, including our own, we had six sevenish-year olds (two boys and four girls) and three nine-ish-year-olds (two boys and one girl). Only some of the kids wore obvious costumes -- we had a pink SuperGirl, two Witches, a Tiger, a Skeleton and perhaps a football player (or a numbered t-shirt) and perhaps a fairy princess (or a pretty dress). (Here, the girl-child is opening presents, her blur indicative of her experience at the party.)Some highlights (in no particular order):
The Hamburger Cake, which although dry and overly sweet, was loved by most of the children. It even had a "burger" in the middle, of brown-color (i.e., not chocolate) frosting. Only one child (whose mother is a Cordon Bleu-trained chef) declined the cake. (His favorite foods, to the annoyance of his mom, are Kraft Mac 'N Cheese and hot dogs, so his temperance on Saturday was an exception.)Piñatas are now de rigueur at children's parties (the creeping influence of Hispanic customs? the straightforward influence of Dora on TV -- which, of course, has Hispanic antecedents?).
Several previous parties (for both children) have been marred by shrieking last minute stays of execution for the candy-stuffed animals. Our gentle-hearted girl throws herself upon the cardboard doll, to the tune of return-shrieking outbursts by her disappointed brother, who somewhat accurately points out that the whacking is what piñatas are all about. We have a collection of unwhacked piñatas, their candy distributed by an adult throwing handfuls in the air. This year, we were assured in advance that indeed children would be allowed to whack the piñata, as long as it wasn't cute -- so we re-used a non-animate Star, rescued by Girl-Child from a friend's party last summer (or plundered, according to the friend, who wasn't so sure she liked sharing her piñata). (It worked quite well, actually -- all the cracks left by previous whackings allowed candy to shoot out in fits and starts so almost every child managed a whack-with-candy-result.)
I don't know if the children thought this a highlight, but we adults got a kick out of our own meager attempts at costumes -- impulse purchases at Ikea last week. We had a droop-eared bunny (we thought we were getting a basset hound -- no color on the packaging), a gray cat, and a chicken.
4 comments:
Looks like fun. My birthday party tolerance is VERY low but our deal is that we have one birthday party a year with the kids taking turns in order of age. With the birthdays in the order they are, it means only 7 months between party one and party two but a glorious 19 months between party two and three (and to be honest, he doesn't notice birthdays yet anyway). On the "off" years we either have family over or they get to pick a restaurant for lunch or dinner. I usually manage to convince my lovely mother-in-law to come for the parties as otherwise I go insane.
Do the parents usually stay for yours or do they drop the kids and run?
A last note for tender-hearted young ones. We were at a kid's party a few weeks ago and instead of whacking the pinata, there were ribbons hanging from it. One ribbon released the flood of lollies. The kids lined up and took turns pulling. Clever mum had tucked the ultimate ribbon up and birthday girl got the last one. Mum got the kids to gather up the lollies and then she divided them up into pretty boxes for everyone. Not quit e the spirit of pinata but the kids were happy.
The parents used to stay, for kids of 5 and under (with negotiation at 6, and still some checking for this one, "Do you want us to stay?" in a tone bravely masking the desire to flee.) It's actually easier without the other parents there to intervene in their child's experience.
Anne's mother allowed one birthday per year, so each child got a party once every 4 years (they are all Fall babies, so the monthly timing wouldn't have made much difference). That just sounds cruel to me, but we were so spread out that, for instance, my brothers didn't "attend" my party, and my sisters had already left home by the time I was having parties -- so... I had a rather egocentric childhood, I suppose.
So pinatas are big down there, too? Where did this fad come from? I am positive the scorn of the brother would far exceed the gain of the ribbon pulling, at least at this age. But a nice idea for younger kids.
There ain't nobody here but us chickens.
I have no idea where the popularity of pinatas comes from. Perhaps it is the pervasive influence of American TV. After all, we even get Oprah here! There certainly isn't a strong Hispanic influence in Australia.
My kids aren't thrilled about them because they hate the mad scramble for the spoils. I can see that I will have to work on their capitalist instincts!
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