I Did Survive

I have a handicap: I commit to a plan (like hosting a birthday party for my 4-year-old) before I think it really through. Like sleeping on it. Chewing on the idea. Letting it simmer.

Nope. That's not for me.

I have a brain child: "Hey, I'm going to throw a birthday party for my daughter. Her daddy is deployed. This will give her something to cheer about."

And then I announce it. Send out invitations, immediately. Invite a dozen of her preschool classmates. And then I think about. Then I sleep on it. Or should I say, I toss and turn, and get up at 3 in the morning and say "What the heck was I thinking?"

So that's my curse, my fault (one of many), but I am here to tell you:

I did survive!

Over the weekend I had a bunch of munchkins over. My daughter, dressed in her mermaid Halloween costume, was the loudest, the most excitable, and she loved it.

So how did I survive doing this all alone with my husband deployed on a ship half-way around the world? This is how...

1. I smiled sweetly at the parents and blocked the door from any that arrived thinking they could simply "drop their children off."
2. I apologized for the menacing Batman pinata hanging from our railing right when you walk in the front door, but its presence let it be known to all kiddos "Behave, Or Else."  
3. I designated our family room to be the "dress up station" and had two big boxes full of dress up clothes, so the parents had to parent all of the children as they could not tell which one was actually their child.
4. I loaded the children up with sugar right at the end of the party, so that the children left just as their sugar highs started to kick in.
5. I had our babysitter stay for the whole two hours. God bless her!
6. Other than the Spiderman cupcakes (Yes, my daughter wanted a Superhero themed birthday party), I did not cook a single thing for the party. (Thank you Pizza Hut; you made a pretty penny. I'm still waiting to win free pizzas by doing the surveys)
7. I used tape on the tails, so Pin the Tail on the Donkey game didn't turn into "Who can poke each other's bum with a tack?"
8. I designated my two-year-old daughter to be the food monitor, as her favorite thing to do is sit and eat and eat and eat while all of the other children were off shrieking and causing all kinds of ruckus.
9. I put a Bean Bag Toss Game in the corner for any child who got in trouble, so it would keep that child out of more trouble.
10. I inhaled the smell of wine through the corks after the last party goer had left, and promised myself that as soon as the baby is born, well as soon as the baby is big enough not to be nursing every two hours, I will savor a glass of wine.

And Taa Daa! I did survive!!

And a big thank you to Stasha of The Good Life for letting me join her Monday Listicles! I know it's not a list of 10 words, but I had to write about my adventure over the weekend :)