Party Mamas- Halifax Style

Have you seen the show Party Mamas?  It follows people around as they plan the biggest, craziest most extravagant (and expensive!) parties for their kids.  One recent episode showed a California Mom throwing a Christmas party in 85F degree weather complete with real snow and a reindeer.

I watch it in fascination of something I will never, ever do.  Liam's had 1 actual birthday party that involved sending out invites to people who aren't on our extended family list. And any birthday that he's ever been invited to has been pretty standard.  Pick a location - bowling alley, museum, pool etc.  Enjoy the facility for 1 hour and then have cake and presents in their party room for 1 hour.  Go home.

This weekend Liam got invited to a party at a bowling alley.  The party was for one of his friend's older brother, who was turning 11. It was a night time party (7:00-9:00) which seemed late to us, but hey, Liam is 7 not 11, so what do we know?

Soon after we arrived, we realized that this was not your ordinary bowling party, where there are 1-2 lanes reserved for the kids and the party room in the back.  The ENTIRE bowling alley was decorated for the birthday.  A table was set up as you came in and the birthday boy was handing out name tags and tickets for door prizes.   They had bowling contests, dance contests, hula-hooping contests.  There were tables of chips and snacks and drinks set up and they eventually brought out 3 cakes.  They had a pinata that they actually let the kids whack with a stick instead of pulling the safe little strings at the bottom. This is a friend from school and we recognized kids that spanned at least 7 different grades. Our rough count, since they were a blur of activity, was 40+ kids.  The birthday boy was on the PA system asking if people had song requests to be played and handing out prizes when kids won tickets from the carnival games.  It was then that we started to figure out what was going on. The family owns the bowling alley!  I had wondered what it would take to get regular league bowlers to give up an entire alley on a Saturday night.

While this party was no where in the leagues of the Party Mamas, it was certainly the most lavish birthday party we've ever been too.