After spending countless hours in thought and effort party planning, supply buying, craft making, and stressing over every detail to see my perfect vision of a party come to realization; it all got dashed to pieces in a matter of seconds. The park required us to "man the shelter" at 11 in the morning, so we were up early packing up everything and finishing up last minute preparations. After loading up two vehicles we headed out. My biggest concern about having an outdoor party was the high heat, little did I know the wind and rain would be my biggest foes; Never did I imagine they would defeat me. Arriving 3 hours prior to party time we got busy setting everything up. Once my beautiful vision was in place the battle of wind vs. party decor quickly ensued. The wind gusts whipped through our shelter and tore through our carefully placed arrangements with the severity of a woman enduring labor contractions. We taped and taped and taped some more, in hopes of somehow cementing my masterpiece in place, but to no avail. There was always some balloon or party hat flying away, centerpiece falling over, and tablecloths flapping in the wind. My sweet parents ran to the rescue every time, even after I had given up on the chase. By party time I was ready for it to be over. As the first guests arrived, so did the rumbles of thunder and strikes of lightning. We braced ourselves for a brief rainstorm, but were not prepared for the hurricane-type weather that came instead. Half my guests quickly made their way to the Carousel, about 20 yds across the park, including my three boys, while the rest of us stayed in the false security of our "shelter". The skies grew black, the winds went into their final transition and the rain fell. What started out as a nice, cool rain shower, turned into my worst nightmare in a matter of a few minutes. As the winds and rain intensity increased our dryness under our shelter rapidly decreased. The vertical downpour became a horizontal torrent. I cringed as everything, and everyone, began to get wet. Then, out of nowhere, the wind and rain turned into a furious beast and blew through the shelter with such force it drenched everything that it also couldn't blow down. Tables, Food, presents, decor, all soaked, including us. All we could do was stand in a helpless, wet huddle and wait for it to end. In the meantime, the birthday boy is screaming, two of my boys are running back to us across an open field with lightening flashing all around them, and my party is blown out onto the grass. Once the worst was over, 30 mins into my 3 hour long party, we threw everything away. Salvaged some food that was covered, but no decor made it through the storm. Against, my strongest desires to pack up and go home, we recouped and tried to make the best out of our time together. The kids played in the muddy lakes of rainwater and the adults embraced their wet dog makeovers. The cake was wet and melted but still tasted great. The sun came out to laugh at mother natures mean sense of humor and we enjoyed the rest of the day. My gracious guests made the party a success just by being there and making the best out of a soggy situation. Thankfully I was wise enough to capture a few shots of my masterpiece before it was ruined. I get sick when I think how I spent all of that time and money on that stuff, for NOTHING. That will be my last park party...my last party (for a while). Will the birthday boy remember this day? No, but we will never forget it. I sat and fed Jett one more time before we left, while my family packed up the cars, and stood up to find Jett had blown out of his diaper onto both me and him. So the party officially ended with me getting shit on, and I think that pretty much sums up my experience with Jett's first birthday party.
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