October 31st, 2016
My youngest daughter turned 8 on October 14th, 2016. We kept both daughters home from school on that day and celebrated as a family. On October 29th, we celebrated with friends at Gym Stars in Smiths Falls. This is where Stella's love of gymnastics began. She attended a friend's birthday party at Gym Stars two years ago and she was hooked.
She always has her birthday party at Gym Stars now and I am forever amazed at the transformations I see throughout the two hour period that we are together. Some of her friends have done gymnastics before. They are excited to participate in a specific activity whether it be hanging and swinging from the bars, walking on the beams, jumping on the trampoline, swinging from the Tarzan rope, showing off their splits on the main floor or vaulting into the air, landing on a big mattress.
There are usually a few new children who have never tried gymnastics. At first, they feel nervous and doubt that they will be able to catch up to the others. However, as they work their way through warm-ups and play fun games, they start to relax. Next, they go through a routine. They are introduced to equipment and guided through the movements safely by a coach. I love that Gym Stars has excellent coaches who always take the safety of their students into consideration.
My favourite part is watching the new kids as they move through the equipment. I take lots of photos and you can see their confidence growing. At first, they are blushing, hesitant, super cautious. By the end of a few rounds, they are beaming, asking me if I am getting a photo of them and, challenging themselves even further. They run to their parents as they come to pick them up. They tell them they had so much fun and they boast about all they have accomplished.
I am so pleased that my daughter chooses to celebrate her birthday at Gym Stars. I know everyone will have fun, it is cheaper than anything I could offer at home, the kids are really tired after so I know they will go to bed on time and sleep well, there is a party room so I can still serve pizza and cake, the instructors are amazing (we had Jenn this time and she was fabulous but, last year, Alisha was wonderful as well) and, I don't need to plan it or clean the house before and after the party. Hooray!!!
As parents, we put so much pressure on ourselves. We love our little ones and work hard to make their special day perfect. If they don't enjoy their party, we are disappointed. Some of us are better at planning parties. We hear about a mom who had a great craft or paid the big bucks to have a Disney character play with the kids. Another mom booked a hall and decorated it to create a special place like a castle. We are exhausted and we just don't want our party to suck. Parenthood has become a competitive sport in some ways. Children go to school after Christmas and compare what Santa got them. They lose a tooth and ask how much the others received from "their" tooth fairy. At one of my workshops, a little boy told me the tooth fairy gave him "fifty bucks" for losing a tooth. I was in shock. Being a parent is hard enough, some of these expectations are just over the top.
Having a place like Gym Stars makes the planning easy. You pick a date and time, send directions, have some food set up, order the cake, prep the goodie bags and then you sit back and enjoy! I would like to thank Jenn for doing such a great job. She started on time, connected with us as soon as we entered the gymnasium, was organized, explained the rules to the children and reinforced them to keep everyone safe and, she stayed a little longer so everyone could finish eating their cake.
If you wish to have a party at home and you don't know what to do, I would like to recommend a craft. In the years before we discovered gymnastics, I always had parties in my home. As soon as everyone had arrived, I would take them into the dining room and lead a craft. If you are thinking you can't do this because you are not crafty, there is great news, you don't need to be.
Step 1-What theme does your child like (princess, dragon, fairy, puppies, a sport)?
Step 2-Locate the closest Dollarama because you can buy cheap art materials there.
Step 3-Get a drop cloth at the Dollar Store (or clear table cloth) and set up the table.
Step 4-Give them a clear directive like they are going to create a princess hat or sculpt a dragon or build a fairy house etc)
Step 5-Have a variety of cheap art materials and non-art materials (tempera paints, stickers, markers, home-made play doh, empty boxes etc).
Step 6-Step back, watch them jump in and explore the materials.
Step 7-Stand by to help the children who need assistance.
Every time I introduce art, I run out of time to do other activities, they are so excited, it lasts longer than I expected. If you have a back yard, it's good to include some physical activity. A trampoline can use up another chunk of time. A soccer ball, football or skipping ropes can also be fun. Blowing bubbles outside can be enjoyable even in cold weather (the bubbles freeze). Young girls love to show off their gymnastics moves or teach each other new ones. If your children are older and can help out, you may want to create an obstacle course together, crawling under chairs, hoola hooping, relay racing, jumping over a bucket etc.
If it's too cold or wet to go outside, there is still plenty to do. When my daughters were younger, I would blow up balloons and have them try to keep the balloons off the ground. This would get the group giggling and, even if someone got hit in the face by a balloon, it didn't hurt. You can also get children involved in making their own food, decorating their pizza or creating a sundae. These are messy activities but the children have fun and it keeps them busy. Having a drop cloth on the table makes cleaning up much easier.
Last but not least, it's good to have some free time. The older they get, the more independent they want to be and just setting up board games or cutting them loose for a while works too. No matter what you do, chances are the children will have fun because they are together and they get to eat cake. They don't care how clean the house is or how much you spent on the cake. I used to clean my house and worry that my house looked messy, then I realized the parents rarely leave the front door. I put a whole lot less pressure on myself and I find that I have way more fun that way.
Anne Walsh
www.artnsoul.org
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