The Party That Almost Wasn't

If someone had told me just two years prior that someday I would know the name and function of every character in the Thomas the Tank Engine series of books, movies, and tv shows.... I probably would have laughed and said, "Yeah right." Yet, that was exactly the result of the weeks of research done in prep for my eldest son's second birthday party.

As our son approached his second birthday party he developed a virtual obsession with all things train related. Which made the choice of theme for his party a no-brainer.

Location was an easy choice as well. We were fortunate enough to have a park just 20 minutes from our home which ran a set of full-size steam-engines and other antique train cars on a set of tracks that circled the perimeter of the park. It ran on weekends, and they sold tickets for just $2 per person. Each ride took roughly 10-15 minutes to complete the loop. To make things even more perfect, there was a beautiful park area complete with picnic tables from which you could watch the train make its trips around the park (a perfect place for games and cake) and there were two retired train cars permanently parked on the grounds that the kids could walk right up to and touch.

Our plan was to have a couple games, a craft, lunch, and cake at the picnic tables, then head over to the train station and have our ride for the grand finale.

Then the fire came.

You see, we live in San Diego and this was October 2007.

The fire began just 6 days before our sons' birthday party. It was late Sunday night as we were driving home we began to smell smoke coming through the vents of our car. Having already lived through the 2003 fires, we immediately sensed something was wrong. As soon as we got home we checked the news and discovered there were fires burning several miles to the east of us. We were concerned for those closer to the fire, but felt no immediate threat to our safety or even our plans, except perhaps for thoughts to avoid playing outside the next day. So we went to sleep. The next morning we awoke to discover the fire had not only grown, but new fires had started to burn and all were out of control. Our neighborhood had been placed on voluntary evacuation. A day later it became mandatory.

Our situation was unique however. We understood that the officials had evacuated our area for the reason that most of the people in our area really had one way in and out due to the placement of the fire. We watched from our window as thousands of cars streamed past our 4th floor apartment. We were glad they were leaving and had we been in their position we would have left as well. It took hours for the cars to clear the road. However, as I said, we had a unique situation. First of all we lived immediately next to that one exit out of the area, immediately next to an unthreatened freeway. We were at the very edge of the evacuation area, opposite the fire. Secondly we could see unobstructed for miles from the window of our apartment since our building was two stories taller than anything else around us and we were on the top floor. Using binoculars, at one point we could see the edge of the fire closest to us, even though it was still at least 8 miles away. We had several cement covered complexes, tar covered streets, and at least 3 large canyons between us and the closest point the fire ever came to us. Also, in San Diego, we know that fires generally follow canyons. The closest canyon to us was 1/3 mile away. We were not stupid, however. We may not have left, but we packed everything immediately upon notification of the evacuation and loaded it into our cars. Our son slept fully clothed and my husband and I slept in shifts every night keeping our binoculars pointed in the direction of the fire, occasionally going up to the roof for an even better view, constantly listening to every news report and watching the fire maps obsessively. Had the fire moved within 5 miles of us or in any other way become more threatening, we would have had plenty of notice, yet we made sure we had the capacity to leave in less than 1 minute and be on the freeway speeding away in less than 3.

That was how we spent most of the week prior to my son's second birthday. By Thursday the threat to our home had been removed. My husband continued to keep an eye on the situation, but my mind turned to my son's party. The fire had come within just a couple miles of the park where we'd planned to hold it and even if the ground wasn't completely covered in ash, as I feared it was, the air quality was still a huge concern- especially since I was expecting my less than 1 month old nephew to attend. I began calling around everywhere I could think of trying to find an indoor alternative. Worrying that the party would be nothing like we hoped. Wondering if those invited would even be able to make it (no one on our guest list lost a home or loved one, but we all knew someone who had). Postponing it was definitely a consideration, but hotel rooms for out-of-town family had been booked in advance, and my son had been counting the "night-nights" until his party. However, after exhausting every possibility for an indoor alternative (they were all either previously booked, way out of our price-range, or the approval process would take too long) I was beginning to feel there was no other choice. Then the weatherman announced a change in the wind that should clear the air with surprising efficiency making it possible to be outdoors again, even by the next day! Still concerned and uncertain, I asked my husband to run out and take a look at the park. I asked him to take some deep breathes and see if it seemed smoky and to look for ashes on the ground. He came back pleasantly surprised and expressed the opinion that having the party there should be okay after all. I knew him to be an honest, and usually realistic person- in fact, I'm the optimist among us- but I was still so nervous, I drove out there myself the night before the party just to be sure. To my amazement you couldn't smell smoke in the air at all, and there were really very few ashes to be seen. The only real signs of the previous week's events to be seen were several tree branches that had been blown down by the wind.

The party was on!

Arriving at the park to set up Saturday morning with my son, we found a crew of volunteers working to clear the tracks of debris. I was told they had been given orders not to run the trains until the tracks had been officially inspected and given the go-ahead, which wouldn't happen for another couple of days. We were disappointed, but still relieved that we were at least able to go on with the rest of our plans. As we made trips between our car and our chosen picnic table, we had to repeatedly pass by the crew who kept commenting on how cute my son looked in his blue denim overalls, red-plaid shirt, bandana, and engineer's hat. Then on our last trip we got a surprising offer. The crew leader offered to give my son an "unofficial birthday trip" on the little Speeder car they were using to get the bags of debris from where they were clearing it back to the station. None of our guests had arrived yet and they weren't due for another 10 minutes at earliest, so we accepted. Needless to say my son was thrilled and it just completely made my day that he got to ride after all.

Despite the 20% chance of rain hanging over our heads and a brief (about 10 minutes) shower we experienced, the party actually turned out quite successfully. We had a picnic canopy which had been brought for shade but which worked nicely to cover the food & guests when it did rain a bit. Fortunately it was warm enough not to be unpleasant rain and no one seemed to mind at all. In fact, several guests smiled and looked up into the shower.

We had prepared several things in advance for our activities, including a collection of train sounds which I had burned to cd and played on a portable CD player for the transition between activities. I had a rope which the children all held onto and we all made train sounds along with the CD as we moved from one game location to another (only about 10 feet away, but with a few creative loops and detours, the transition became a game of its own). I had also balled up several clumps of foil to be "coal" and brought along buckets. We split the party guests into two teams, gave a two sentence explaination of how steam engines need to coal to "go", and had them race to get all the "coal" from their pile into their team's bucket the fastest. Everybody "won" that game and they all picked from another large bucket full of packaged cream cookies, packaged sandwich crakers, and lollipops. Another party item was a poster-sized painting of the front of Thomas which I sketched out and painted in advance. Then I traced his smile onto a piece of copy paper, copied that smile a dozen times on the copier, and cut each smile out. At the party we hung the Thomas poster from the back of a barbeque stone-surround and played, "Stick the Smile on Thomas". Our third activity was the easiest to prepare. I bought a stack of white foam rectagles that were already cut to half the size of a sheet of paper. Then, before the party, I cut out windows in about a dozen of the rectangles to create frames. We provided our guests with stickers, markers, and glitter glue to decorate their frames and we took them over one-by-one to get their picture taken in front of one of the permanently parked train cars. While they were decorating, by husband printed their pictures on our small portable printer and the guests were able to take home their decorated frames complete with photo as part of their party favors. They also received a goody bag filled with things we'd picked up from the Dollar Tree. Since the ages of our young guests ranged from infant to 6 we had prelabled each bag with a name to make sure everyone got something age-appropriate. In hind-sight, these bags were probably over-kill, but we'd got them before coming up with the frame idea and they couldn't be returned. Of course, I didn't hear any of the kids complaining. ;-D

Another idea I should have skipped was the activities for the adults. Yes, I did plan activities for the adults since, I reasoned, there would be adults there who were not parents (e.g. grandparents) and who might grow bored simply watching the kids play. So I came up with three pen and paper activities to keep them entertained. I made several copies of each and set them on the table along with a few pens where the gifts were left as the guests arrived. I think my grandmother was the only one to even pay them more than a glance and that was probably out of pity. Contrary to my concern, the adults had a great time "just" sitting and watching the kids do their games and activities. . . . . Now I know. :-D

Afterward, I had several of the adults say that they had a great time at the party and I have seen at least one family's frames still on display in their house a few months later. So, I think that is a good indication that things really did go well.

A note about gifts: There are several people in our circle of family and friends who live on very slim budgets in which there is little or no room for birthday gifts. For my son, the point of his birthday has never been about the gifts, but always about how many of his friends and loved ones will be there. We have therefore made it a point to include some version of "Your presence is desired. Presents not required." in our invitations. Since we therefore expect some of our guests to arrive without a gift, we purposely set our gift table in a place slightly off from, or toward the back of, the party and with the exception of my eldest son's first birthday, we have never opened gifts during the party. However, keeping in mind that some people enjoy seeing their gift opened, we do quietly make it known that should a gift giver want to see their gift opened, they may remain after the party and request that it be opened. This has worked out very nicely so far and seems to be something everyone is comfortable with.


P.S. Did I mention I was several months pregnant when all this happened? And that I home-baked, carved, and decorated a 3-dimensional Thomas the Tank Engine plus one freight car for the birthday cake- finishing it around 1am the night before the party? .... I must have been insane!