Poor Jeremy. His birthday is June 28th. The last time we celebrated his birthday at home, in normal, non-travel surroundings, was 2003. ISH. I'm not even sure about that. It might have been more like 2001, which would mean that Jeremy has been shortchanged on the birthday celebrations during the entirety of our marriage.
I mean, we always celebrate it, but sometimes "celebrate" means "order ice cream sundaes from McDonald's and have them delivered to our door," as we did last year in Cairo.
This year, with our Summer at Home going on, we decided to have an actual party (yesterday). Behold, the extent of my party decorating skills:
I know, let the fun begin, right?
(ALTHOUGH. One really exciting thing about having a party at our house was that it prompted us to finally hang up some pictures. The beauty you see behind the party table is an IKEA special. I like to pretend that there is a window on that wall, and that is the view we see outside of it. Sigh.)
In my defense, I acquired a bunch of balloons and planned to blow them up, but they were so tough that I could only manage two. They floated around the party lamely until someone took pity on them and managed to blow up some more to keep them company.
As an introvert, I experienced a lot of anxiety leading up to the party regarding my role as its planner. I don't know how an extrovert thinks, so I had trouble figuring out how spaces, snack layouts, activities, and seating areas should flow. I ended up just doing whatever (as in, it's possible that some snack items were presented unceremoniously in mixing bowls. The horror! I didn't think to bust out my fancy silver tray, dangit!) and I think it worked out fine. We designated a 10-year-old as the Fun Manager and she ran a rocking, never-ending game of Star Singer or whatever it's called, so that was brilliant. Another friend brought along some henna, and by the end of the party, every kid in the house was henna'd - along with a few adults, too.
After everyone left and I had a chance to calm down and assess how things went, I realized I had a lot of chips and snacks still left in the kitchen that I should have been more vigilant about refilling empty (mixing) bowls with. Oh well.
I'm glad Jeremy got a proper birthday party for once, and with friends like ours, who are willing to overlook some inept hostessing, I think we could manage to do this every year.
Happy 35th, Jeremy!
I mean, we always celebrate it, but sometimes "celebrate" means "order ice cream sundaes from McDonald's and have them delivered to our door," as we did last year in Cairo.
This year, with our Summer at Home going on, we decided to have an actual party (yesterday). Behold, the extent of my party decorating skills:
(ALTHOUGH. One really exciting thing about having a party at our house was that it prompted us to finally hang up some pictures. The beauty you see behind the party table is an IKEA special. I like to pretend that there is a window on that wall, and that is the view we see outside of it. Sigh.)
In my defense, I acquired a bunch of balloons and planned to blow them up, but they were so tough that I could only manage two. They floated around the party lamely until someone took pity on them and managed to blow up some more to keep them company.
As an introvert, I experienced a lot of anxiety leading up to the party regarding my role as its planner. I don't know how an extrovert thinks, so I had trouble figuring out how spaces, snack layouts, activities, and seating areas should flow. I ended up just doing whatever (as in, it's possible that some snack items were presented unceremoniously in mixing bowls. The horror! I didn't think to bust out my fancy silver tray, dangit!) and I think it worked out fine. We designated a 10-year-old as the Fun Manager and she ran a rocking, never-ending game of Star Singer or whatever it's called, so that was brilliant. Another friend brought along some henna, and by the end of the party, every kid in the house was henna'd - along with a few adults, too.
After everyone left and I had a chance to calm down and assess how things went, I realized I had a lot of chips and snacks still left in the kitchen that I should have been more vigilant about refilling empty (mixing) bowls with. Oh well.
I'm glad Jeremy got a proper birthday party for once, and with friends like ours, who are willing to overlook some inept hostessing, I think we could manage to do this every year.
Happy 35th, Jeremy!