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captainsblogThe last of the kids just left here, from our first-in-awhile home-based celebration of Emily's birthday- her 17th today.
Her first birthday was a day-care-only affair, knowing as we did that she was too little to understand anything that was going on. Since we were at a JCC facility at the time, their kosher rules kept out most cakes, so here's what I think was a kugel with way too many candles on it:
(Sorry about the detritus on that; it has been 16 years, after all. That's one of her early boyfriends, Craig, in the next high chair, and some other kid named Rachel whining in the background. )
In other early years, we were a regular First Stop on the annual party circuit, since we had the first birthday of the calendar year. We did the obligatory Buffalo Zoo party when I think Em was 3- a later album has pictures of her holding the big parrot and crafting up a storm- and other years were spent at a Hyatt's Art Store Make Mess Till You Drop party, a trip to the new downtown arena to see an ice show, and at least one variation on the verminous curse that goes by the name Chuckie Cheese.
The past few years, not so much. We did have one home-based party here that I remember- I want to say it was '02, so her 10th- where I'd painstakingly worked out a scavenger hunt for the mostly after-school daycare crowd she remained the tightest with. That came to a bad end quickly, when it was discovered that one of the kids was stealing the poetic handwritten clues I'd left at each of the stations. Care to guess what not one but both of HER parents do for a living?
This year, though, Em really wanted to have some friends over for something relatively simple: pizza and snacks, goofy anime spoofs on YouTube (the Avatar riff I found a few weeks back, along with another anime one on a similar theme which they found themselves) and the original Men in Black and Young Frankenstein outtakes on the television. She's gotten too old for one-for-each year candles, so I spaced out the nine boogies de feet as imaginatively as I could, assigned each color a number, and told her they added up to 17. Amazingly, I think they did.
Nine girls, two reasonably well-behaved guys, four shell-shocked animals, and two parents spending most of their afternoon keeping the most skittish dog company- who proceeded to eat up all the attention, as well as most of the leftovers we brought to her as peace offerings of guilt.
The miracle of Emily's birth is one I still remember, but the ongoing yet unrepeatable miracle of her life is one I give thanks for every day- especially on the third day of each New Year.
Her first birthday was a day-care-only affair, knowing as we did that she was too little to understand anything that was going on. Since we were at a JCC facility at the time, their kosher rules kept out most cakes, so here's what I think was a kugel with way too many candles on it:
(Sorry about the detritus on that; it has been 16 years, after all. That's one of her early boyfriends, Craig, in the next high chair, and some other kid named Rachel whining in the background. )
In other early years, we were a regular First Stop on the annual party circuit, since we had the first birthday of the calendar year. We did the obligatory Buffalo Zoo party when I think Em was 3- a later album has pictures of her holding the big parrot and crafting up a storm- and other years were spent at a Hyatt's Art Store Make Mess Till You Drop party, a trip to the new downtown arena to see an ice show, and at least one variation on the verminous curse that goes by the name Chuckie Cheese.
The past few years, not so much. We did have one home-based party here that I remember- I want to say it was '02, so her 10th- where I'd painstakingly worked out a scavenger hunt for the mostly after-school daycare crowd she remained the tightest with. That came to a bad end quickly, when it was discovered that one of the kids was stealing the poetic handwritten clues I'd left at each of the stations. Care to guess what not one but both of HER parents do for a living?
This year, though, Em really wanted to have some friends over for something relatively simple: pizza and snacks, goofy anime spoofs on YouTube (the Avatar riff I found a few weeks back, along with another anime one on a similar theme which they found themselves) and the original Men in Black and Young Frankenstein outtakes on the television. She's gotten too old for one-for-each year candles, so I spaced out the nine boogies de feet as imaginatively as I could, assigned each color a number, and told her they added up to 17. Amazingly, I think they did.
Nine girls, two reasonably well-behaved guys, four shell-shocked animals, and two parents spending most of their afternoon keeping the most skittish dog company- who proceeded to eat up all the attention, as well as most of the leftovers we brought to her as peace offerings of guilt.
The miracle of Emily's birth is one I still remember, but the ongoing yet unrepeatable miracle of her life is one I give thanks for every day- especially on the third day of each New Year.
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Date: 2009-01-04 04:49 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-01-04 10:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-01-05 01:23 am (UTC)And kugel...Mmmmmmmm. I taught music at a JCC for a while, and one of the things I miss most is their annual Cafe' Hadassah.