Two Sundays ago I took my daughter to two birthday parties, back to back. Five straight hours of partying. Woo-freakin-hoo.
Of course it was one of the weekends my wife was working, so off I went to the parties, with three kids in tow.
Party #1. Started off pretty straightforward, the kids made a craft of some sort and ate pizza and cake. There was enough cake for the grown ups too, so that was definitely a plus. Like I said the party started off pretty normal, then things got weird. Out came a DJ and then a dance party broke out. Have you ever seen a large group of seven year olds dance? It’s pretty entertaining. It was basically a whole bunch of kids jumping up and down with balloons screaming and yelling.
My favorite part of party #1 happened near the end. The dance floor area the people had rented also doubled as a yoga studio on the weekends. During the party, a couple of first time yoga people showed up for their yoga class early, expecting the calm serenity of a yoga studio overlooking the water. Instead they were treated to a dance party. Nothing says serenity quite like a group of seven year old girls all hopped up on sugar jumping around to Radio Disney.
We grabbed our goody bags, hopped in the car, drove from one side of the city to the other, wiped the icing off our faces and made it just in time to the second party.
Party #2. This party was at the mall. The freaking mall., on a cold Sunday afternoon, where apparently everyone goes when it’s too cold to do anything outside.
The “littles” and I dropped off Eliose with the party people and had two hours to kill, in a mall. It might as well have been for a week. I managed to find a sporting goods store so we looked around in there for a while. Now what do we do with the hour and forty five minutes left? I considered stopping in one of the mall restaurants for a beer, but I don’t think my kids would have found that too interesting.
We did spend quite a bit of time at the Lego store, that was cool. It was kind of weird seeing groups of guys in their 20’s and 30’s spending hundreds of dollars on Lego Star Wars items, but hey, to each his own, I guess.
We ended up spending the last half-hour or so with the party at Build a Bear. Talk about a zoo, that place was crazy. It was the first time I’d ever been to one and I doubt it will be the last, unfortunately. Of course, after Eloise made her bear, she wanted to add accessories. I told her she could buy one thing to add to her bear and off she went looking for the perfect accessory. A few minutes later she came back with underwear. Bear underwear. I had to walk up to the cash register with bear underwear in my hand. I kid you not, the sweet girl at the counter said to me, “Just the bear panties for you today sir?” With my head hanging low, I handed over four dollars and a good chunk of my dignity in return for a mall brown bag containing bear underwear.
When we finally got home from the day and my cake buzz wore off, I was exhausted. Kid birthday parties are nuts. It’s a good thing I have a full week to recover before I have to go to one again.
-Pete