Where's Martha Stewart When You Need Her?

Mercifully, the last week is already starting to fade into some kind of foggy mess in my mind. My mother told me once that her years parenting young children are either a blank or a blur, and that seems to happen to me too. Possibly so I can face the next week.

Last Saturday I threw a birthday party for M, her very first "friend" party. Now, you have to understand, I am not an entertainer at all. I don't plan shindigs for my friends, I don't casually invite my neighbors over for a BBQ, and I don't host any of the family get-togethers. Only on a very rare occasion have I thrown a dinner party of the most casual kind. Neither am I a social party-goer. (It's that shyness problem.) If I go to a party, it's out of duty, not because I think I'll have a smashing good time.

But anyway, M has been bugging me for a long time to have a real birthday party, and I finally relented. Turning eight is a special birthday, after all. It was kind of unfortunate, really, that her birthday fell so close to the triathlon because I was pretty wiped out. But I figured, hey, my sister Camie would be there to help (she's the party thrower) so it would all go fine.

Tuesday before the big day I got a phone call from Camie. She'd snagged an amazing deal on some Disneyland Park Hopper tickets, but they had to be used before Sunday. So she wasn't going to be around for the party.

Gulp.

I had four days to prepare myself for the fact that I would be on my own. It wasn't too bad-- I planned for a bag decorating activity, a game or two, a piñata, and cupcake decorating (takes up way more time than just eating cake.) After collecting all my supplies, I figured I was as ready as I would get. But I forgot one tiny little detail.

Terence works on Saturday. Oops. Not only was my sister not going to be there to help me out, neither would my husband. It was going to be just me and up to ten guests plus my four kids. How on earth was that going to be possible???? One adult to fourteen kids? Fourteen kids going wild with glue, glitter, markers, a piñata stick, and frosting-coated knives? (Well, K wasn't going to be doing any of that, but I doubted he was going to let me put him down, either.) At first I found myself hoping that no one but a couple kids would show (I had only gotten one RSVP.) But then I got worried that no one but M's cousin would show up, and she would be so disappointed if none of her friends came to her one-and-only friend party.

No need to worry. Seven kids showed up. About a half hour into the party, I was standing in the living room, juggling a squirmy K and spinning a board for a very rowdy game of Twister when I realized that K needed a diaper change. Boy, did he stink. But what to do? Leave all the kids on their own while I change a diaper? Let K sit in it for the next 1 1/2 hours and hope it doesn't leak? Then, my salvation walked in the door. One of the kids from M's school class was late, and his mom asked if she could stay. Hallelujah!!!! She took over the Twister duties while I hastily changed K, then took over the baby so I could handle the piñata. And when it came to cupcake decorating time, I don't know how we could have made it without her. (My niece Jaci helped quite a bit too. Whew!)

Needless to say, when the kids had tripped out the door, my living room was a shambles, strewn with candy wrappers and shreds of piñata and wrapping paper and boxes. The kitchen was less of a mess-- I'd had the sense to use plastic tablecloths that I could just roll up and stuff in the trash. Still, every knife I owned was caked in frosting and scattered all around the room, and the floor was covered in gold glitter and paper scraps. (The next day Terence declared that glitter would never enter our house again, for any reason. It migrated everywhere.)

Still, we had all survived, and best of all, M had really enjoyed herself. But when it was over, I took a deep breath and prepared to face the coming week. I knew it would be bad, but I didn't know just how bad. Next post I'll get into the details. Assuming my brain hasn't erased them from existence by then.