Good Enough Mom: Birthday Party Survival Guide

Every year our kids get a choice between having a special day out with mom and dad or having a birthday party. I love our special days out. The birthday parties. . . .not so much. I mean, I love making my kid happy and seeing him/her have fun with friends, but that's about it. No one is going to be pinning my Minecraft desserts or clever American Girl decorations on Pinterest, mainly because I have no idea how to make those things actually happen.

I suspect I'm not alone in this; despite what I see in parenting magazines and on Pinterest, most moms I know don't host thematic birthday parties with handmade decorations, healthy homemade snacks and parent supervised games. If you are one of those moms, you can stop reading and go write a business plan for the kids' party business that you should start immediately.

If you are not one of those moms, read on:

Prior to the party:

• Find a venue. The easiest way to handle this is to ask your kid where s/he wants the party and use that one. Unless your kid wants it at your house. Then ask for his/her second choice, because unless your house is huge and has a big yard (and good weather at party time), you'll regret it.  If budget is a concern, look for a smaller local business rather than  a chain of bouncy places. Video game stores, candy stores, cooking schools, karate schools, dance schools, movie theaters and sports places can all be fun places to have parties. If it's winter, pick a place where kids can run around a bit. In the spring and summer, a local playground can work, especially if you pay a couple of energetic teenagers to play with the kids. 
• Use Evite. It will keep track of responses and allow you to send out reminders. Plus you can personalize the invitation (for free) in about 5 minutes. No stress, no organization and no need for stamps. 
• Nail down the details. Ideally, the venue can provide the food, paper goods and goody bags. If not, drag the birthday kid to the party supply store and let him/her pick out the paper goods and the goody bag stuff. Then, organize it together once you get home - at least the day before the actual party. As for food, order pizza and a cake and worry no more. 

At the party:

• Arrive early. Especially if you have to bring goody bags or cake, you'll want to arrive 10 minutes early so you can be all set up before guests start arriving. 
• Greet each kid by name. I substitute taught for a while and I quickly discovered that kids behave better if you know their names. If that means the birthday kid has to whisper each classmate's name into your ear as they arrive, so be it. 
• Set the parents free. Once kids are in kindergarten, they don't all need their parents hovering over them at the party. Plus, if all the parents are there, you'll have to make small talk with them. And chances are you'll have more kids misbehaving if mom or dad is there. Weird, but true. 
• Manage, don't hover. If you've picked a place that's used to having kids' birthday parties, you probably won't even need to manage. Let the party helpers encourage the shy kids and keep kids behaving appropriately. But if some guest is very unhappy, or very inappropriate, feel free to intervene. 

After the party:

• Record who gifts are from. If your kid is out of preschool, s/he can write thank you notes. Or thank you emails. Your job is just to make a list that s/he can use. 
• Have a drink. Being around a group of over-excited children is exhausting; I was less tired teaching a class of 25 first graders for an entire day than I am after one of my kids' birthday parties. 

Party Pooped

There's a business in a nearby town that is almost entirely devoted to personalized birthday favors. Well, I think it is. I've never actually been in there. But the kids have gotten adorable gift bags with personalized frisbees and whatnot in them. As well as candy. All from a store that I've never heard anyone refer to in any other context.

We've been to a birthday party that had a moonwalk, clown, hot dog cart and 4 cakes. And that was a first birthday party.Mostly, we've been to parties at indoor play places. But occasionally we've been to decked out yards, with visits from Dora and Diego. Once we went to a party that had a clown, a singer and a balloon maker.

I mention all this because Ironflower's birthday is a scant 2 months away. And there are 19 kids in her class. So we're looking at inviting 25 kids to the party, or thereabouts. That will pretty much double the exorbitant fee we'll be paying for the party space in the first place.

When I relayed this to a Kansas City friend of mine, she was kind of horrified. Party spaces and personalized favors didn't happen in her preschooler's world.

And when I lamented to a New Jersey mom that I wished my kids had been born in the summer so I could have a party in my yard, she was horrified by the thought of the clean up and organizing involved.

All I can think is, isn't celebrating a birthday supposed to be FUN? Why am I stressing about this 2 months ahead of time? Oh, right. Ironflower wants what all her friends have: her class at a party place where she will get to be the center of attention. And cute gift bags. And probably a new outfit for the event.

At least I'll have  break until Lovebug's birthday in March. And at least his class is small. And he probably won't care about the outfit.

What about you? What are birthday parties like in your neck of the woods?

Party Like A Rock Star

The coolest birthday party I had a child consisted of 10 girls going to the Ground Round (think precursor to Chuck E. Cheese) and sleeping over. I was 10 that year and I still remember it. Cake and presents were involved. Sleeping in sleeping bags on the family room floor. Very cool stuff.

Yesterday we attended a birthday party that had a clown, a bouncy castle, a wading pool, a sprinkler, a massive tent with seating for thirty, a personalized banner, a hotdog vendor, cupcakes and cake, hamburgers/chips/guacamole/bruschetta/salad and tons of Coronas for the parents. It was cooler than any birthday party I've ever been to.

And it was for a one year old.

I don't want to be a judgmental cow. I know that there are plenty of things that are imperfect about my parenting. After all, Ironflower was the only child who had a tantrum at the party (she was putting dirt into the wading pool as some sort of deranged science experiment and didn't want to be coaxed - okay, dragged - away). But all the birthday boy did was watch the clown and eat some cake. And while everything was videotaped and camcordered up the wazoo, what's he really going to remember about it? Nothing.

Maybe I'm just jealous that I don't have a couple of thousand to drop on my kids' birthday parties. Although judging from their behavior yesterday, all Ironflower needs is a wading pool and all Lovebug needs is a bouncer. But how are they going to top this party next year? And the year after?

I probably won't find out. We were invited because the birthday boy's aunt is my best friend from high school and because the birthday boy lives a few doors up the street from my parents. We will never fit in with that crowd, regardless of the fact that I went to high school with a lot of them. I can't do this over-the-top extravagant parenting.

Interestingly, many of the most extravagant parents I've met have nannies. The birthday boy's mother, for example, works sixty hour weeks and has a photography business on the side. Their nanny was at the birthday party, she seemed very sweet, caring and hot (according to Hot Guy). She certainly spent a lot of time with the birthday boy. But I just wonder how much time do mommy and daddy get to spend with the birthday boy? Is there perhaps some guilt in the face of all this extravagance?

Maybe I just want to think that because my kids are probably never going to have a birthday party like that. Even if we could afford it. I can think of so many other things that we could do for the kids with a couple thousand dollars. I'm not saying that we won't have birthday parties, we already make a big production of going to Build-a-Bear and the child's restaurant of choice. But with an extra few thousand I wouldn't invite twenty other little people to Build-a-Bear, I'd buy books and stimulating toys and a trip somewhere fun.

Does that make me anti-social?