Small groups are better...

Busy, busy weekend for this girl.

Let’s recap.

Saturday was the Princess’ birthday party, so my one day off for the summer was scheduled to be spent running errands to prepare for the big soiree. Which, I did end up doing – along with my girlfriend Nancy who was gracious enough to volunteer to spend the day with me AND have a sleepover that night! Which was perfect since I was having a dinner party with some of my girlfriends that evening, she being one of them! So, in addition to running errands and whatnot – I cooked dinner for about 10 girls. Nothing super strenuous – spiral ham, shrimp scampi, garden salad and rolls. We did manage to squeeze in a little fou fou girly time for a pedicure, which was great.

Then, after all the fun of the girl’s dinner – was the birthday party. Which, I’m going to vent about for my last time regarding parties and RSVP’s. Because after all, if you’re upset about a situation, what should you do? You should fix it, right? So that is what I’m going to do. People don’t respond – which means you never know who’s coming and who isn’t. So while I cut my list down from how large it usually is – I still was planning for 50+ people. We didn’t get quite that many, which means the food that I had leftover was just…insane. And though I didn’t grill like I usually do – I opted for the catered route, and so I had a TON of food. I had 8 pizzas, a huge fruit salad, potato salad, pasta salad, cold cut platter, chicken broccoli and ziti, and eggplant parmesean. Seriously, people had to take food home – which isnt’ a bad thing but truly was a necessity because I had so much left over.

The upside to all of this is that it taught me two things.

1. I’m done with being grillmaster for the parties. Having it catered like this was fantastic! It was easier in the big scheme of things which made this girls life easier overall, however….

2. I’m all set with inviting everyone and their mother. Because I invite all my friends – all the kids friends (and that’s perfectly fine, I’ll always do that) but all the extended families who say to me “Oh Rebecca, please don’t downsize the parties because you’re party is the only one we get to see everyone at…” but no one RSVPs…and then no one shows. And truly, it’s too much of an expense to do it – and too frustrating for me.

I’m a firm believer that it doesn’t matter who doesn’t come – it’s those who do that are important. However, when you’re paying the bill for those who don’t show, then it starts to feel like it matters. And I don’t care for focusing on that during a birthday party. So, no more!

There, I feel better already.

How’s that for self therapy!