Birthday Survival

Oh, the greed. The greed! "Presents! Presents! Presents!" The chant haunts me. I hear it in my sleep. I hear it when I'm reading the paper. I hear it in the car. Those two monkeys have it down to a science: Just when I'm relaxing, just when I least expect it, "Can we open more presents?"

What do others do with the great present dilemma? My philosophy has been to spread the opening of presents out, because when we do it all at once, there's a great frenzy, a look of pure drunkenness that overtakes my children. They don't appreciate what they receive, because there's more, more, MORE! But then you spread it out, so you have days and days of the begging, the pleading. Of course, it is one more thing I can hold of their heads ("If you don't get your tushies up here right now, then there will be no presents tonight! I'm counting! One...two..."). The woes of birthday lust.

So, we made it through another birthday, with no rain (minor drizzle only), too much sugar, and a frenzied mom. I was up way too late decorating birthday cakes, but the day of the party went off without a hitch. The parties, though, are always a blur because even though there isn't that much for me to do day of event, I feel like I'm slightly frantic. The preschoolers did movement (with a fabulous woman who really ran with the whole Egypt theme--the kids went to the Nile, picked reeds to make papyrus, walked with a camel hump, hiked through the desert, were mummified, and of course built a pyramid), the toddlers did art, the pizza arrived on time, and a good time was had by, well, I think I can safely say, most. I'm sure there were a few dissatisfied kids in the group, because we are dealing with the two to four year old set. I completely overbought (no time for the Egyptian and train tattoos; did I really think a bunch of two year olds were going to paint wooden miniature trains? Um, well, actually I did, but luckily, Michael's has a great return policy...)


And then there's me. By focusing on the party I can forget that my baby Pie is two and my wee Doodlebug is now four. Today was Pie's last day at her daycare, as she transitions to Doodles's preschool, and I'm feeling rather sad about the affair. Oh, I'm very happy she's going to the preschool for a number of reasons: I love the program, it's way cheaper than a day care, it'll be easier to have both kids in the same place. But we've been at that daycare for four years now, and the teachers have really been there for us. Pie loves that place and every school morning, she runs to grab her lunch bag, give me and Doodles smooches, and lists off everyone she's about to go see. "See Cawol. See Mia. See Jeffwey. See Hewen." I know she'll get a new list of friends at her new school, but it'll take a while. The guilt, the guilt! Does the mommy guilt ever end? Sigh.

So birthdays are over and within the next twenty-four hours, all presents will have been opened and (hopefully) all thank yous will have been sent out, and we can say good-bye to Birthday '07. Which means there's only one thing left to do. Start planning the Hanukkah party....