The kids' 6th science-y birthday party

I feel like I have to write some of this down before I forget it all.

Invites
After agonising about who to invite, we settled on a set number of kids for K, C and me :) The school invites were completely out of my hands but I basically invited kids my children had spent time with over the last year, minus the ones from the pre-school that they no longer see.



RSVPs
I say this every year but I honest-to-goodness want to throttle people for not just saying YES or NO. Why is this so hard? Check your schedule, speak to your spouse and say yes or no.

We had the worst number of RSVPs ever....even after I reprinted the invites and popped in the bags again after the RSVP by date.

My friends at least RSVPd quickly :)

One parent RSVPd on the Monday before the party, about 10 days later....

Anyway, on the bright side (and Lord knows we need to look for a bright side), all those who RSVPd actually pitched.



The venue
From the time we first went to Sci-Bono at the beginning of last year, I've wanted to have a party there. It is fabulous inside. If you haven't been, go!

The reason I needed the numbers confirmed was because the venue allowed only a certain number of people. Of course, such a small number of people pitched that we had no problems in the end.

I actually considered either having a science party at home, or just paying for each family to enter the venue, but in the end I just sucked up the "wasted" cost and paid the party price.

The party price included entrance to the museum, a guided tour, science demonstration and gifts for each birthday child.



Food
I know from previous years that people just don't eat much early in the morning so we didn't have a lot of food. Good thing because of the transporting food to a venue story. I sent all the chips and juices to school when schools reopened for their Friday snack.

The cakes were made by Pick and Pay, as they usually are, and were delicious.



My attitude
I honestly would rather have had the holiday instead of a party (used the party money to stay a day or two longer!) but of course, I was outvoted by D and the kids. And so I was freaked out before we went on holiday due to these RSVPs, mainly because I wanted my kids to have a nice party and it seemed like there would be only 6 kids total.

I really wanted to cancel at one point but D said it didn't matter if there were 6 kids or 16; our kids would still have a nice time. I wasn't convinced but I knew I was stressed with work and not thinking clearly so I just left it.

Once we went on holiday and I paid for the party, I relaxed into that state of not giving a toss anymore. Can I blame it on the beach?


The day of
People pitched, the venue was ready, the co-ordinators were friendly and good with kids and it was lovely. Honestly.

I got a few good pics but not as great as I'd have got outside. Then again, I have winter babies so basically it's inside parties forever.

I'd encouraged the guests to go explore and play in the museum afterwards so once the party ended, that's what we all did.

We overstayed our welcome by far - the party was 10 - 12, we were there from 9:30 - 16:20. We even heard the "the museum will be closing in 20 minutes" announcement.

I had a BALL!

We had once "incident" but that's a story for another day. Maybe.



Presents
This was the best part of the small party - only 5 presents :)



Thank-you notes
This year we recorded individual voicemail messages for each of those 5 families and we sent them by text.

They are VERY cute - I still have them. If I knew how to embed them here, I'd attach one.

And seems like the recipients enjoyed those thank-yous too.



Next time
I've already told all 3 of them that things will be Very Different next year:

1. no parties during school holidays
2. we are going on holidays without worrying about this party business
3. we're having two small parties on the same day at home!

On another note
I've been keeping records and I told D we've only been to 4 parties this year - 3 kids of friends (Robyn's two kids!) and 1 school friend.
D said, "no wonder it feels like we have a life again" :)

So, what do you think?
Is this school holiday non-RSVP thing a thing?

And then, proof that I was there :)