There's a great social contract out here in Sydney suburbia: if some parents throw a birthday party for their kid, the other parents get to completely dump off their kids at said party then disappear to wherever they want and just show up at the party again at pick-up time 2-3 hours later. Brilliant! The LLDD-Hyphen-L and I didn't know about this the first time we took the LLDD-Baby to a schoolmate's birthday party, so we were the only grown ups awkwardly hanging around the venue until a late arriving mom came over to us and said "well i'm heading off to the pub for a beer, you coming?" Again, brilliant!
And it's not like we're just abandoning the kids at some desolate wasteland. The parties are always held at someplace fun and pretty. So far, we've been to a town hall's playplace:
...even a golf course's practice green!
Now, far be it from the LLDD-Hyphen-L and myself to break local custom, so when it was the LLDD-Baby's birthday, we threw a party at a local Lego activity center and took in as many of her friends and classmates as we could - to the absentee delight of their parents!
To be clear, there is consideration to the birthday party social contract: we, the celebrant's parents, relieve you, the non-celebrant's parents, of your kids - feed them, entertain them, give them goodie bags and whatnot - for two plus hours...and in return, the birthday girl gets to go home with a presents haul.
Dabby birthdays to y'all!
...an arts and crafts cafe
...a park's picnic area...
...a mall's arcade...
...even a golf course's practice green!
Now, far be it from the LLDD-Hyphen-L and myself to break local custom, so when it was the LLDD-Baby's birthday, we threw a party at a local Lego activity center and took in as many of her friends and classmates as we could - to the absentee delight of their parents!
To be clear, there is consideration to the birthday party social contract: we, the celebrant's parents, relieve you, the non-celebrant's parents, of your kids - feed them, entertain them, give them goodie bags and whatnot - for two plus hours...and in return, the birthday girl gets to go home with a presents haul.
Dabby birthdays to y'all!
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