Alice's 7th Birthday Party: Princesses, Nail/Makeup Salon, and the Pool

Pinata!

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Getting Pinata candy

January 29, 2011

Alice's birthday party ended with me explaining to her that she will never again have a warm-weather, swimming pool party outdoors on her birthday in January again in her life. She countered that maybe there will be a warm January day in New York when we could have a pool party at Nanny and Papa's house. I didn't add that she will probably never again want a princess party, because it'll seem too "babyish" by next year. Today was the last of the princess parties, in our home.

And, what a princess party it was. Alice envisioned this party 6 months ago when she first set foot next to our apartment pool, before we even signed the lease. Pool and Princess. We had a Nail/Makeup Salon set up with our two babysitters manning it. And, everyone got their own hula hoop and jump rope, which are all the rage at 1st grade recess at Alice's school. Alice is obsessed with jumping rope, the same way she was with the jungle gym in NYC.

The princesses arrived, with an awkward start. All of them seemed nervous, probably after the hype of getting gussied up in their royal finery. But, soon, they got giggly and excited about their nail polish, facial jewelery, tattoos, and sparkly eye shadow. They jumped rope. (Click HERE) They jumped into the pool. You might ask, as we logical adults did beforehand, if they would swim after all that makeup artistry was applied to their faces. They didn't think twice about jumping in. Then, they just ran back to the salon and got makeup again, happy as wet princesses. After that, they got overexcited because they got to apply makeup to Kenny, gigging hysterically at all the cross-dressing implications, not realizing that they gave him more of a makeup job that looked like measles rather than Paris Hilton.

Birthdays here aren't so different here than in the US. The girls ate pizza. They hit a pinata that was unbreakable, only finally beaten to a pulp by Ken (Our Venezuelan friend made the pinata and cupcakes for us, coaching us on the pinata hitting throughout). Click HERE and HERE for the two pinata videos. And, blowing out a candle that looked like fireworks (Click HERE to see). And, the after-party was almost more fun than the party, with lots of water-balloon making and throwing --with near-hysterical letting loose of all that pent-up party energy.

Alice ended it saying it was her only and last birthday in Malaysia.