Strange Magic: The Over-the-Top Kids’ Birthday Party

  We all know how over-the-top kids’ birthday parties can be nowadays. For a variety of reasons, I’ve avoided throwing either of my kids a big birthday bash for the last three years—which really sucks for the little one, who is just three. So this year I decided to do it—to host a big throwdown for my daughters who have birthdays just three days apart. They came up with a theme perfect for the preschool sect: Purple Rainbow Sprinkles.   And I went all out, inviting both of their classes and most of our friends until the guest list rivaled my wedding. My parents flew in as reinforcements and I paid one of our beloved babysitters to stake out the exact spot I wanted in the park at 7 a.m. (reservations are on a first-come basis). I made a Pinterest board and stayed up late in the night crafting and cursing. I spent more money than I’ll ever admit to even though I kept things pretty simple and was charged, several times by my husband — correctly — with being a control freak when I insisted upon an exact color scheme (“It’s rainbow,” he argued, “doesn’t every color work?”) for a maypole I made him make (it turned out awesome).

But at some point as I punched flower shapes out of watermelon, I turned a corner and started letting go. I decided to let my kids create all the crafts (their stuff looked better than mine anyways). We painted purple rainbows and made hundreds of cupcakes. The always-sunny skies in Los Angeles darkened the day before the party and it rained. Every rainbow party, we decided, needs a little rain, especially during California’s horrific drought. The party was on. And it turned out perfect. My dearest friends showed up and transformed a beautiful piece of park into a rainbow wonderland.

  My kids arrived not wearing the adorable party dresses I’d picked out, but in thrashed leggings with bird nests of tangles in their hair. They kicked off their rain boots and got to the business of having fun barefoot. We had a kid-run “Sprinkle Bar” and the most magnetic performer ever, who had the kids dancing in fairy wings and running around on a crystal hunt. Kids climbed trees, made fairy dust, created mayhem at the maypole, wore rainbow headdresses they made, and had their faces painted and bejeweled. They all looked like the magical creatures they are.