A Family New Year’s Eve
A Family New Year’s Eve
Maggie credits her clever friend Martha with this genius idea. Maggie and Martha were co-homeroom mothers for their daughters’ first grade class and became fast friends. Martha is one of the most engaging women on the planet.
- Invite two or three families with young children for a New Year’s Eve potluck.
- Tell the kids about a week ahead of time that if they are really good – really behave – they will be allowed to stay up until midnight.
- After the kids go to bed on December 30, turn all the clocks in the house back three hours. The tricky part here is to monitor the TV the next day so that the kids don’t realize from the programming schedule that something is amiss. Have them watch DVD’s. The younger the children, the easier this is to pull off.
- Feed them a good snack at four o’clock (they think it’s seven o’clock), telling them that since they are staying up until midnight, dinner won’t be until nine o’clock. Kids just love this!
- Arrive at the party at six o’clock (which the kids think is nine o’clock), eat dinner, play games, and at nine o’clock let loose with fireworks, noise-makers, sing auld lang syne, throw confetti, and toast with sparkling cider. Then promptly pack the kids up, with the adults yawning and telling each other how tired they are (which is undoubtedly true), and head home to put the kids to bed and try to stay up until real midnight yourselves!
