CHAPTER LVIII

A SUCCESSFUL CHILDREN’S PARTY

A WORD TO GROWN-UPS

IT is undoubtedly one of the hardest tasks imaginable to give a successful children’s party, and the reasons that militate against success are legion.

In the first place children are the keenest of critics; secondly, that which interests a mite of three will bring boredom unmitigated to the “fellow of ten,” while the maiden of twelve and the “man” of fifteen have very strong views of their own on the subject of amusements.

A children’s party, then, is not an undertaking to be approached lightly. It is of course an easy matter to hire the services of a ventriloquist or a conjurer or some public entertainer for the afternoon, and leave the rest to luck, yet how many hostesses have come to grief on the rocks of such an enterprise.

And let it be remembered that it is an absolute impossibility to provide an entertainment that will appeal equally to children ranging from three to fifteen. Only a section will appreciate the show. Far better to let the youngsters be their own entertainers.

It may of course be presumed that no one will dream of giving a children’s party who is the occupant of a very small house. Twenty children want more room than fifty adults. This is a truism that cannot be too strongly emphasized.

Having fixed upon the date for your party and having sent out the invitations, you will, wise general that you are, take complete stock of your field of campaign, and make up your mind that at least four rooms will have to be more or less gutted to receive the host of youthful invaders you are about to summon forth.

Let it be supposed that you have in your house three sitting-rooms. The dining-room will be the refreshment room, the parlor, stripped of all breakables and needless accessories, for the older children to play in, the morning room to be converted into a dressing-room. Upstairs it will be as well to transform a bedroom into a play-room for the tiny tots and their nurses.

There is one fatal mistake that hostesses are sometimes guilty of in giving a children’s party,--they ask their guests to come too early and send them away too late. The secret of success with children lies in the one hackneyed sentence: “Enough is as good as a feast.” Children are easily tired, and they can crowd into three hours as much healthy enjoyment as would certainly not be the case were another hour to be given them. If your young guests leave you with regret you do not want any more thanks; if they fly to get their coats and hats, all your labors, no matter how sincere and arduous they may have been, will have been spent in vain.

From four till seven P.M. will be found quite long enough, with tea at half-past four. Here again lies another fatal pitfall. _Avoid kickshaws!_--digestion-ruining cream cakes and jam puffs particularly. Bread and butter, chocolate biscuits, plain cakes, and sponge cakes produce no ill effects. Such advice as this may provoke a scornful laugh from the would-be hostess who reads these lines. “Teach me how to feed children!” I hear her say. “What presumption!” Yet it is homely advice that is the most useful, the most disregarded when all is said and done.

TEA TIME

Half-past four will be found a good time for tea. Soon after five the healthiest hunger will have been appeased, and then, having “let digestion wait on appetite,” marshal your guests into the drawing-room and allow them to “fall to” to amuse themselves.

Let the revels be of the simplest. If there is one game children love more than another it is Musical Chairs, and as there cannot be a person living, who does not know that historic pastime, there will be no need to describe it in detail.

However, among your young guests you will be sure to find one or two boys who do not care to play the game, yet who can be made exceedingly useful in another way as “umpires.” Most boys of fourteen or fifteen have a great sense of honor when games are under consideration; let two boys, then, be the arbiters of the sport--let them decide whether, when the music stopped, Tommy found a seat before Johnny, or whether Billy was too rough when he pushed Mary aside and took the seat that should have been hers. You will have no need to grumble at the impartiality or the reverse of the young umpires.

After Musical Chairs, what better than Blind Man’s Buff, a game that never stales, made more exciting if “Buff,” after having caught a victim, fails to identify his prey, and must therefore pay a forfeit to be chosen by his captive? Children love forfeits.

Hissing and Clapping, Dumb Crambo, Acting Proverbs--there is no end to the games that children love. And let them choose their own. You will add a thousandfold to the success of your party if you allow your guests to please themselves, and by so doing you will give yourself far more pleasure than would be the case if you “fussed about” arranging, directing, ordering. Children love responsibility as much as “grown-ups.”

Above all, remember that “Boys will be boys.” It is only with the greatest tact that you will be able to eliminate the boisterous element, which will crop up now and again in the best regulated parties. If you can enlist in your services some jolly bachelor who loves children, and who can romp with them as a child, you will have solved the problem of keeping down the rowdy element. A man of this stamp can work wonders with an obstreperous youngster, can smooth out the creases in your handiwork, can keep things at concert pitch, and if at the end of the party he is a worn-out and exhausted wreck--being who he is, he won’t mind.

So seven o’clock comes. The time for farewells has arrived. Wraps and coats must be put on, and the little ones, flushed, excited, happy, are dispatched to their various homes.

“Thank you so much, it has been fun.” “We’ve had a ripping time, thank you.” “It’s been splendid.” Such thanks as these will repay you for three hours of babel and pandemonium, for all the forethought and tact you have brought to bear on a by no means too easy task.