Little Miss’ birthday is fast approaching, and with her birthday being one month before this new baby is expected I had some new factors to think about.
Having a party at the house would have been the most economical and sensible, but it isn’t a possibility. We live on an insanely busy road with no street parking or even a shoulder, and our driveway could only accommodate a few vehicles. We don’t have a yard for kids to play in so much as we have every parent’s nightmare: no grass, lots of rocks and gravel, abundant poison ivy, and oh, yeah, the cars driving right next to the property at 50+ MPH. Not to mention the minefield of dog crap.
Add in a high-strung dog who weighs in at 70-lbs and a hugely pregnant woman, and you get a place wholly unsuitable for a large group of children.
Instead, I shelled out $300 to The Little Gym for the privilege of having our party there. The fee includes an hour and a half of play time, utensils and paper goods for food consumption, two Little Gym instructors to supervise and facilitate the party, juice and water, balloons for all the kids and a t-shirt for the birthday kid. They do all the set-up and clean-up and will keep track of who gave what gift. They will even send the invitations if you like. (I set an Evite)
All I need to provide is the cake, the guests, and goody bags. Goody bags are the scourge of modern birthdays. “Thanks for coming to our party! Here’s a bag of cheap plastic crap that will break within a week and some shitty candy!” Last year I bought a bunch of plastic animals to decorate the cake with and let each kid choose which animal they wanted on their piece and they kept the animal. Probably the other parents thought I was a cheap bitch but I don’t care. This year I ordered pre-filled bags from Oriental Trading Co. The charge for avoiding shopping for and assembling goody bags for 15 kids: $64.
So basically I am paying $400 so I can sit on my ass and observe my kid’s birthday and avoid all the work of throwing the party.
At least the Evite was free.
1 response so far ↓
Jennie // September 13, 2008 at 5:40 pm
At least its something she’ll remember! My mom always went crazy w/my birthdays – I had more than one at Chuck E. Cheese as well.
My kids don’t get parties, they get a big cake.
Little Gym is a great idea! I try to avoid taking Goody Bags at parties, I would have loved the “take one animal off the cake” party.