Baby Gabe's Wild Birthday
Hola Wild Boy friends and family. I know, it's been forever. I blogged right before Christmas, and since then I've been preoccupied with basketball and just trying to keep the kids alive in general. But I'm back, because right now I have about three glorious weeks in between basketball and baseball. It's fantastic, but for the fact it's also blizzarding on almost every one of my days off. It's the snowiest winter we've had in a decade, and I vividly remember this because it was ten years ago this week that baby Gabriel graced us with his presence, and there was three feet of snow friends. These boys NEVER make anything simple.
But if you've been following along, you realize this means that this week my BABY turns 10. It's a pretty big deal. He told me in the car the other day that he doesn't understand why people make such a big deal out of it, but that everyone seems to "party a lot harder" once they hit the magic 1-0. I don't even know what that means, but suddenly it made my plans for his birthday seem lame. What's the equivalent of jello shots and strippers for fourth graders? Clearly other parents know and are making it happen. Whereas I took the ultimate cop out - the old pizza party/arcade party.
First off, I'd like to defend this decision a little bit. I mean, he ASKED to go to an arcade. And because we live in BFE we actually had to load up vehicles with amped up ten year old boys and drive over an hour to get to this place. So I did make an effort, dang it. I barely survive car rides with my own kids, and when I'm driving other ones I feel like I can't just order them to "hold it" when they have to pee, especially once I'm told "Jen, when a man needs to go, a man needs to go." By a ten year old. Sorry to that parent, because while I was laughing at your kid I was also letting him pee on the side of the road. Ain't nobody got time for pee pants on party day. Unless that's actually part of the harder partying and I missed an opportunity there...this is so hard!
We finally made it to our party location - John's Incredible Pizza. Now, as a child of the 80's I have had several Chuck-E Cheese birthday parties. Somehow in the 80's Chuck-E Cheese seemed way less creepy. Less molester laden. And for sure (please God) less full of pee in the ball pit. Maybe my perception is skewed now because I'm older. But John's doesn't give off that vibe. Nor does John's have the robot vermin singing on stage, slightly off time while their mouths click-clack open and shut and one robot invariably has an eyelid stuck open giving you the glass eyed pirate stare. We can't go to places like that anyhow, since my kids discovered Five Nights at Freddy's...I can't afford therapy right now, I just started paying for braces. So, John's it was. And John's is like Chuck-E Cheese on steroids, anyhow. Buffets, arcade games, rides...it's like a kid wonderland!
As a responsible parent I did force every child to eat before unleashing them on the arcade, and I started with super good intentions and only had pitchers of non-caffeinated soda delivered to our party room. But as our time progressed they found the icee machine and at one point I was rushed by a kid with a developing eye twitch yelling "I NEED TOKENS AND ICEES!!!!!!" so it seems like I lost that battle. And I finally decided hey, it's a party. Relax. This place is FULL of parties tonight. Nobody cares if these kids are super...exuberant, lets say. Although I didn't at any point get as relaxed as the party next to us, who eventually left one adult in charge while the rest of them went out to their cars to smoke some serious ganja then hit the dessert buffet on the way back in. THAT party had some seriously relaxed parents, is all I'm saying. Also, they single handedly wiped out the rice crispy treats, brownies, and the soft serve, not that I'm tattling. But it did break my heart enough that I wasn't up to fighting with our party about "responsible prize buying" with the 8 gajillion tickets they amassed. Sorry again, parents, for the lava lamps, kazoos and GIANT inflatable ball that these kids staggered home with. Oh...and the balloon animals the party hostess made them all. That was one hell of a car ride home, may I say? With kazoos and balloons aplenty, through torrential downpours and (at higher elevations) whiteout snow conditions. All that with no rice crispy treats. There should be some kind of parenting award. The cop was lucky - he had the one kid that fell asleep. No such luck in my car, where the kids decided to sing karaoke but only to Baby Shark and songs by the Spice Girls.
We ended the evening dropping off kids that were exhausted, out way past their bedtimes, jacked up on coke icees and chocolate cake, with lava lamps. So maybe when all is said and done we did do some hard partying, ten year old style. All I know is nobody peed their pants. I hope that's not a requirement...if so I guess there's always 11.
Until next time, party on.
But if you've been following along, you realize this means that this week my BABY turns 10. It's a pretty big deal. He told me in the car the other day that he doesn't understand why people make such a big deal out of it, but that everyone seems to "party a lot harder" once they hit the magic 1-0. I don't even know what that means, but suddenly it made my plans for his birthday seem lame. What's the equivalent of jello shots and strippers for fourth graders? Clearly other parents know and are making it happen. Whereas I took the ultimate cop out - the old pizza party/arcade party.
First off, I'd like to defend this decision a little bit. I mean, he ASKED to go to an arcade. And because we live in BFE we actually had to load up vehicles with amped up ten year old boys and drive over an hour to get to this place. So I did make an effort, dang it. I barely survive car rides with my own kids, and when I'm driving other ones I feel like I can't just order them to "hold it" when they have to pee, especially once I'm told "Jen, when a man needs to go, a man needs to go." By a ten year old. Sorry to that parent, because while I was laughing at your kid I was also letting him pee on the side of the road. Ain't nobody got time for pee pants on party day. Unless that's actually part of the harder partying and I missed an opportunity there...this is so hard!
We finally made it to our party location - John's Incredible Pizza. Now, as a child of the 80's I have had several Chuck-E Cheese birthday parties. Somehow in the 80's Chuck-E Cheese seemed way less creepy. Less molester laden. And for sure (please God) less full of pee in the ball pit. Maybe my perception is skewed now because I'm older. But John's doesn't give off that vibe. Nor does John's have the robot vermin singing on stage, slightly off time while their mouths click-clack open and shut and one robot invariably has an eyelid stuck open giving you the glass eyed pirate stare. We can't go to places like that anyhow, since my kids discovered Five Nights at Freddy's...I can't afford therapy right now, I just started paying for braces. So, John's it was. And John's is like Chuck-E Cheese on steroids, anyhow. Buffets, arcade games, rides...it's like a kid wonderland!
As a responsible parent I did force every child to eat before unleashing them on the arcade, and I started with super good intentions and only had pitchers of non-caffeinated soda delivered to our party room. But as our time progressed they found the icee machine and at one point I was rushed by a kid with a developing eye twitch yelling "I NEED TOKENS AND ICEES!!!!!!" so it seems like I lost that battle. And I finally decided hey, it's a party. Relax. This place is FULL of parties tonight. Nobody cares if these kids are super...exuberant, lets say. Although I didn't at any point get as relaxed as the party next to us, who eventually left one adult in charge while the rest of them went out to their cars to smoke some serious ganja then hit the dessert buffet on the way back in. THAT party had some seriously relaxed parents, is all I'm saying. Also, they single handedly wiped out the rice crispy treats, brownies, and the soft serve, not that I'm tattling. But it did break my heart enough that I wasn't up to fighting with our party about "responsible prize buying" with the 8 gajillion tickets they amassed. Sorry again, parents, for the lava lamps, kazoos and GIANT inflatable ball that these kids staggered home with. Oh...and the balloon animals the party hostess made them all. That was one hell of a car ride home, may I say? With kazoos and balloons aplenty, through torrential downpours and (at higher elevations) whiteout snow conditions. All that with no rice crispy treats. There should be some kind of parenting award. The cop was lucky - he had the one kid that fell asleep. No such luck in my car, where the kids decided to sing karaoke but only to Baby Shark and songs by the Spice Girls.
We ended the evening dropping off kids that were exhausted, out way past their bedtimes, jacked up on coke icees and chocolate cake, with lava lamps. So maybe when all is said and done we did do some hard partying, ten year old style. All I know is nobody peed their pants. I hope that's not a requirement...if so I guess there's always 11.
Until next time, party on.
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