My son, Sam, turned three last week. We invited his new classmates over to our house Sunday in the late afternoon and let the kids run around the backyard. It was a beautiful early fall day — sunny, but with a cool breeze. Our leaves are beginning to change around the edges, but we still have some roses out and a few other late summer flowers in addition to the autumnal mums. There was beer. Pizza. Fruit. Cupcakes. Yoo-Hoo chocolate drink and, to atone for that, fruit juice boxes with a serving of vegetables thrown in.
I like hosting Sunday night parties. One of my insights into making the most of weekends is that Sundays can set the tone for the rest of the week. Even if you like your job, it’s possible to succumb to Sunday night blues as you ponder your commute, or whatever stresses are waiting for you. Planning something fun for late afternoon or early evening Sunday keeps you focused on the pleasure to come, rather than time’s inexorable slide into Monday morning.
Sunday parties also have a few other things going for them. First, everyone is free. People are busy with kids’ sports and such on Saturday. But Sunday evening is a remarkably low-traffic time. My paperless post invite didn’t make it into a few inboxes, but when I told those families in Sam’s class about the party on Saturday, they were still able to come. Second, no one expects anything fancy on Sunday night. Saturday nights are for high style. Sunday nights you can serve Yoo-Hoo and it’s all good. It was a fairly relaxing party.
And on another note, Sam is three! He’s grown up so much in the last year, and turns out to have all kinds of interesting thoughts and ideas. On the drive home from our Labor Day trip, he saw a horse trailer and upon learning there was a horse inside, pointed out a U-haul with a killer whale image on it, and told us there was a killer whale in there. “Daddy,” he asked, “have you ever seen a killer whale jump out of the water and into the back of a truck like that?” We were pushing things a bit to get him potty trained for preschool, but he rose to the occasion and has done great. He’s become smitten with this little girl in his class. For so long he’s been pretty focused on his older brother, so it’s fun to see him make his own friends.
Now on to the next birthday, with a little girl turning one on Friday…
Photo courtesy flickr user soapylovedeb
Probably for the same reason as students, academics tend to be pretty busy on Sunday nights.
I’m curious about what time on Sunday you scheduled the party! We did Saturday morning at 10am and that worked pretty well too.
And funny that you have two with such close birthdays as well – ours are less than 2 weeks apart, and I’m not sure how that’s going to go for future parties ;D