a cooper confession: Fall Recap #9...birthday party

#9....Emerson's Birthday Party (october 13)

well, all I can say is that we survived and she was happy. it was organized chaos...or some might say disorganized chaos. but let's start at the beginning.

last year at this time, emerson was having a hard time at school. she had zero friends. see...she couldn't really communicate and play make believe with the other girls. so she did what she knew how...pushed and tugged on the girls (kind of like she played with carter). well, needless to say...the girls were not too found of this. since the friends list was pretty narrow, we had a party a peter piper with all the students of el pozo. emerson had a great time with all her "big" friends.

now fast forward one year. with a year under her belt, her friend list has grown. her request this year was to be able to invite her friends from school. but since she couldn't name them and i had no idea which students were close to her, we decided to invite both kindergarten classes...60 kids. doesn't sound too bad...huh?

let me explain mexican kid parties from their school. they are like 4 or 5 hours, the entire family is usually invited, and you feed everyone a meal. most of the time someone caters it and there are tons of things for the kids to do. i knew it would be a challange, but how many kids would really come?

we had the party at the casa verde. there was no way i was going to have a party planner and caterer for my 5 year old's birthday party (can we say MTV sweet sixteen) so the entire staff lined up to help cook, entertain, paint faces, and be some moral support. the students at the casa verde volunteered to man the craft stations, fill goody bags, and cook. it was a rainbow theme so there were lots of painting, coloring, and making jewelry with fruit loops. we even pulled out all of carter and emerson's costumes from past consignment shopping and made a dress up area...the kids loved that part.

when the actual day came, i wasn't sure who was coming, if anyone. it was going to go one of two ways in my mind....no one would show because i don't know a lot of the parents or everyone would come to see a gringo party. well.........15 minutes after the party started, we had over 40. 30 minutes into the party, there were 70. and by the end, we counted more than 100 people at the party. IT WAS CRAZY!

the kids had a great time. they dressed up, painted, and jumped on the inflatable. (THANK YOU NANA AND PA....my mom said she would rent an inflatable for the party to help with entertaining. all i can say...LIFESAVER!) the parents really enjoyed themselves. the casa verde students and staff were amazing. and to top it off, my friends roquel and lois made an amazing surprise birthday cake...rainbow on the inside. emerson loved it.

it was an event...but so worth it when i looked out at emerson playing with her friends and saw the smile on her face.