Barbara Basford: The Party

The Party

I am beginning the planning process for my son Kenneth’s eleventh birthday party next April. I haven’t convinced him of the theme yet, but I would like to do a carnival themed party. He would really like to have a magician perform and this would fit in nicely. We have a no gifts rule and invite his entire class of about 35-40 students as well as a few cousins who are close to his age and his Cub Scout buddies. With this many kids I want a myriad of activities that they can move to individually. What will we offer for games or activities? Will the food/snacks have the carnie theme? What will the invitations look like? I’d like the work to be front-end loaded so that I can circulate during the party. I do not mind lots of work as long as most of it can be done ahead of time. The other parties (magic, science, insects, outdoors, pirates) have been successful due to the meticulous preplanning. So…..Let’s get started.

First we have we’ll have to book the magician – even though it’s a few months away, there aren’t many magicians in the area. The next thing to organize is careful observation of every carnival and fair that comes to the area this summer. I will be taking lots of notes about the games that are offered and thinking about which ones I can easily replicate. Now, onto the food. Carnival food, fair food, circus food – it’s all so wonderfully bad for you that this will be fun. We can get the machines to make cotton candy and popcorn easily, and bribe the older cousins or some former students to run them during the party. Someone must have a Sno-Cone machine in their basement. Hot dogs and fried dough, lemonade – yippee! And of course, the cake must be spectacular. Wild colors, maybe make it into the shape of the merry go round, ferris wheel or some other ride. Kenneth and I will need costumes…maybe everyone will need costumes that they can pick as they enter the party, along with waiting in line to get tickets to the activities. The smell of the carnival should greet them, but maybe the entry booth will be set up so that the whole show is not visible as they enter…

But once inside the party perimeters you will see the line of games and food booths all strategically laid out. There will be games of chance like breaking the balloons with darts (note – need to talk about the rules of using darts, etc.) squirt guns that, upon careful aim through the clown’s mouth will fill a balloon with water, a ball rolling along the surface of painted bakers pans while held in place by a make-shift rope ring, and finally a game of throwing a ball to knock a series of weighted “milk” bottles from the place on a stool.

Looking at the other side of the party row are several rides for lots of fun.

“Oh, oh,” I thought. “What if someone hurts themselves on one of those rides? Maybe I’d better call my insurance agent and get a rider on my policy in case someone gets hurt.

“Nah, that’ll never happen,” I told myself. But I will get some extra Bandaids, and some antiseptic. Whenever there are kids, there are bound to be boo-boos. So I’ll add those to my shopping list, as well as sunscreen.

And just to be on the safe side, I’ll ask the Moms who deliver their precious cargoes to my door to let me know where they’ll be – leave me a cell phone number or whatever, so I can contact them in a hurry….if I have to. “Golly, I’m thinking like a teacher, here.”

Cell phones, what would we do without them? I really resisted when my spouse started trying to talk me into getting one. I didn’t like the idea of people being able to intrude on my space and thoughts whenever they wanted to.

Okay, back to the party. I wonder if it’s worth trying to slip any healthy foods into the mix, maybe some interesting things the kids may not have tried before. Maybe we can even turn that into a kind of game, with a contest to see how many new kinds of foods they’ll try, and tell what they like best and least. There could be a Water and Worldly Foods booth. They could earn penny prizes for trying things.

Good weather will be a must. I’ll have to consult the Farmer’s Almanac and talk to God. This is a great start, now I will begin creating the lists.