Worst Birthday Party EVER!

Life has been so crazy this week that I haven't had much chance to post and funnily enough, I actually have enough fodder for several posts this week.

I will start today with J's birthday.  My middle child, J, turned 5 on December 2nd.  As her birthday fell on a week day, we took her to the movie Tangled for a special birthday treat and held her party on the Saturday.  BTW, I have to say Tangled was a GREAT movie.  We absolutely loved it. And the kids did too. ;)

Beef #1 : RSVPS.  Why do people not bother to take the time to let you know whether or not their child is coming?  Because it can go either way, you still have to do up goody bags for everyone that was invited.. just in case. 

Beef #2:  Arrive on time. We had one kid show up 20 minutes before hand and one kid show up 20 minutes late.  The late kid I knew was definitely coming so we were waiting for him.  Then you figure well if they're late maybe a non RSVP'd kid was going to be late too.  You just don't know.

Those are all minor hiccups though.  The real problems started when guest kid #1 saw guest kid #2 arriving and immediately started having a panic attack because guest kid #2 apparently isn't nice to them (these are all kids from the same class).  Crap.  So my oldest takes guest kid #1 upstairs to play away from #2.  I'm feeling sorry for kid #1 because I know #2 is pretty energetic and bouncy kind of kid and #1 was pretty sweet. 

However, I quickly learned that          Sweet = High Maintenance

It turned out that both kid #1 and kid #2 are control freaks, want everything their own way and that's why they are clashing all the time.  Only kid #1 is more sensitive and prone to break down and cry while #2 brushes it off.

Still the first half of the party goes pretty well except that kid #1 doesn't want to do anything except play the piano.  So J is complaining that #1 isn't playing with her.  Add to that my three year old, O.  His friend Josh had come to the party, he is almost 5 himself and went to preschool with J as well and is now going with O.  Josh is just about the cutest little boy on the planet.  O suddenly decides that whatever Josh is playing with O has to take away.

It was supposed to be a cupcake party but I forgot from last year... just how quickly the little munchkins can decorate and eat two cupcakes.  Kinda makes the hours I spent baking cupcakes, coloring icing and setting out pretty bowls with sprinkles etc seem like a waste of time.  I could just slopped everything on the table and told them to have at it.  The results would have been the same.

Then my oldest (7) E has to get into the picture.  She wants the kids to play her games.  None of the kids wnat to play her games.  So she starts to whine about how no one wants to play and she's sick of playing these baby games.  (the party has only been on for like 1/2 hour).  Then the entire time J was opening her presents I get to listen to E whine about how J's presents were better than what she got and how she never gets such nice presents or she really wanted a pink zhu zhu pet too.  THE ENTIRE TIME.  I'm not kidding, E got sent to her room twice, had daddy yelling and reading her the riot act while she was up there only to come down sulking and pouting.

Kid #1 is mad because everyone is being too noisy for us to hear her play the piano.  All the kids decide they have to rip open J's presents immediately and play tea party to which I become some sort of maid fetching them water and mopping up spills.  They then decided to dump skittles into their "tea" and when I finally call a halt to the game... kid #2 defies me by dumping all the skittle water from the tea cups  back into the tea pot so she can reserve it all and then proceeds to run around the house with a water filled tea potty dumping enough water on the floor that it is literally making puddles.  Kid #1 starts to cry and whine about wanting to go home but her dad was the only parent I forgot to get a phone number for. 

The two boys J invited were the best kids ever.  I am sure they were glad to go home and get away from our noisy chaotic home.  Hmm both those boys were only children...... a connection?  I'm just saying.

So the whole party was spent refereeing two kids from fighting, dealing with a grumpy E and trying to convince O that it was okay for Josh to play with the Dora chairs.

It was the longest two hours I have ever spent in my life.