You know the Jonzes, right? Those hipster, über-crafty people that are always sharing gorgeous photos of their latest super-awesome projects for us normals to drool over. Then we take those pictures and pin them to our boards on Pinterest, in the hopes that someday our own homes will look just as lovey. Thanks to Pinterest and the Jonzes, we now can all know how to create gallery-worthy prints with a blank canvas and some mod podge, or how to make pretty decorative wreaths with paper cups, or how to easiy up the hip factor on anything by adding a bird. OK, I don’t know if a Jonze would actually spell their name like that – being a wannabe hipster, I can only guess. 😀

Lately I’ve been exploring Pinterest looking for inspiration for my daughter’s fourth birthday. I am planning a small tea party for her and a few other girls her age. There are some gorgeous pictures online – truly beautiful – and I got caught up in it all pretty quickly. As I started to make a crazy-long list of the things I’d need, I stopped myself – am I going overboard? Do we really need professionally-made cupcakes that match the party colour scheme? Why do I have a colour scheme for a four year old’s birthday party in the first place?

This is actually the first year that we are having a birthday party for my daughter. Up until now, we’ve just had family and a couple close friends over, and that’s always worked out nicely. But this past year we’ve been to a lot of birthday parties and now my daughter is expecting one too. To be honest, most of the parties were really nice. I like how many of them requested no gifts – it made the parties more of a celebration of friendship. One of the families asked each parent to bring something for the loot bags instead of a gift, handmade if possible – I have to say those loot bags were awesome. One birthday party was based on the story Stone Soup and we each brought a vegetable for the pot – I love how that party taught the kids the value in sharing and community.

On the other hand, I’ve also been to my share of standard birthday parties with tons of sugar-buzzed kids running around, followed closely behind by nervous parents trying to keep the chocolate icing away from the white carpet.

Big crazy parties seem to be the norm these days. I remember listening to my coworker talk about birthday parties for 20 four year olds – this was way back, before my first daughter was born. She talked about renting ponies and hiring actresses that dress up as Disney princesses. Every party had to be bigger and better and I just couldn’t even imagine what they’d do for the tenth or eleventh birthday – rent a cruise ship? A private party at Disney World? It just all becomes so crazy.

But now here I am, in my own way, caught up in it all. I may not be going big, but I still want it to be beautiful. I want the party hats to match the bunting and I want spectacular cupcakes with purple and orange icing to match the paper lanterns. Does it matter? Do the cupcakes need to be that fancy, or will the kids appreciate plain old chocolate more?

It’s hard to keep perspective. At the same, it’s easy to criticise everyone else for going overboard. I haven’t found a balance yet for myself. I’m still making my own bunting and possibly some matching hats. I’m not satisfied that it’s enough yet. Maybe if I put a bird on it…