young man, are you listening to me?

Over the weekend I took the twins to the birthday party of two of their friends. I am obsessed with going to kids parties even though when I’m there I could rip off my ears from the noise and scratch my eyes out with boredom. No, I like going for one reason alone: I have to know that I throw the most kick-ass parties.

Parties are important to me. I always loved them when I was growing up and it is really important for me to create the best memories and Kodak moments for my kids.

I have a vigorous rating system used to judge other people’s parties on various categories:

Category 1: Strength of entertainment.

When I was growing up, having a clown was unheard of. It was all pass the parcel, pin the tail on the donkey, musical statues, musical chairs, and dead lions. I was great at dead lions because if there is one thing in life I can excel at its being still and not doing anything. I am champ at that. But now I live in Israel and there is no way on god’s sweet earth that I am going to attempt controlling a room full of rowdy 4 year olds with my Hebrew. I draw the line there and there must be a clown.

The clown has to be good and not at all annoying. I can’t stand that pulling a long piece of paper out of your mouth trick. Setting fire to that piece of paper and magically making it become sweets: that IS cool. You should be on whatever reality show has you becoming Uri Gellar’s next apprentice. Repeated use of “hamutziim” (pickles) in place of “hamudiim” (cuties) is also the sort of behaviour that will make me visualize myself performing matrix-style fight scene manouvers in slow motion at your head. Balloon hats go down well. Even better is when every kid gets a balloon sword or butterfly or whatever. I have found the best clown ever from the excellent recommendation of a friend, and I have mentioned before that I AM IN LOVE WITH HIM. He engages the kids, remembers all their names, he is funny (even for the parents), and he is the best clown I have seen. Ever. And he’s hot but we’ve already established this is the married woman in me talking. I already know that TimTam will do our party next year. And maybe my birthday too, not sure yet.

Hand in hand with entertainment and on the strength of yesterday’s party, I think I should add a category especially for use of music:
Witch Doctor = 20 points
YMCA = 100 points
The birdie song = –90 points
…with actions = –20000 points.
I must say I was very pleased to see use of the village people at a 4 year old’s party. Great to see the Y and M in action, less so to see the C and A then sort of become a heartless flap to the right then to the left.

Category 2: Food.
The food is a good measure for how well people can host a party. Pizzas smack of taking the “throw money at it” option. Hot dogs smack of “all kids eat hot dogs, right?” lack of creative thinking. Not to mention that its well known that hot dogs are full of crap and you have to slice them into 2 or preferably 4 lengthways in order not to choke on them, yes even in 4 year olds. I have a friend who worked at the children’s hospital and this is a conversation for another time but believe me, she KNOWS. Food for the parents is also important. We are still at the age where the parents hang around and they expect food. Good food. Shakshuka and quiche score. Dry cake, big X.

Category 3: The Cake.
The final test is the cake. Baking a cake in a tin foil case and putting a shop-bought piece of sugar paper on it looks so tacky. Shop-bought cakes go back to the “throw money at it” option. No, in order to out do me, you are going to have to CONSTRUCT your cake and make it into something totally imaginative and at the same time wildly appetizing. In other words, a pirate ship and a princess castle.

Avoid avoid avoid:
Now, the worst thing of all to do at a party would be to set a powerpoint presentation of all your baby photos to some heavy arty music and make your guests endure 5 minutes of you thinking that your child is the most adorable thing in the universe. This is hard enough to sit through at the bar mitzvah. GOD FORBID but it might be ok at the funeral. Frankly I’d rather watch a powerpoint set to celine dion with pictures of puppies and bunnies, followed by taking a gun and blowing my brains out.

The party yesterday has a good rating, even though there were various violations of badass party etiquette. The balloon decorations scored extra points.

Best of all though, the party nursed my ego because hevrei (people)…I still kick party ass!