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Cautionary Tales For Children
Wonderful witty poems great for reading to your children. The stories and rhymes will stay with them for the rest of their lives.
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Research has shown how important YOU are to your children and how as a dad the things you do, and keep on doing, really count, whether you live with them, or you are a single dad and are only able see them once a month, once a week or more, what you do really matters. This site is dedicated to all dads but will be of special relevance to the single dad. Remember, you are half the reason your children exist and they need you whether you live with them or not. As their dad, you have what it takes to make their lives successful and fulfilling no matter how often you see them. This site is about all the positive things that we as parents have to offer our children.
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Party Planner
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A dad's guide to successfully putting on a kid's party to remember, even if you're on a tight budget
A typical kid’s birthday party is expected to last for about two hours. If you haven’t got a plan, then this can be a very long time to have loads of kids rampaging through your house with the vague idea that they will do a few games and eat at some point. Most kid’s parties are expected to follow a similar format. Remember that most kids will have much more experience of kids parties than you do, because they are always going to them. This page outlines a simple plan (but you can also get a printout of the plan below).
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When your guests arrive make sure that you have each parent's phone number and that each child is properly introduced to you so that they know who you are and you know which little person belongs to which grown up. Under the age of about 7 it is quite usual for parents to stay with their children. So you might need to plan to have some tea or coffee and biscuits standing by for the parents. Also make sure that you have film for your camera, or it is fully charged (with memory card) and or you have the video with spare tape or disc ready and charged too, if you have one.
Outline party plan
Guests arrive
10 minutes
Receive gifts and put them to one side for later, making sure you know who has brought which present (write the names down), in case you want to thank the mothers or write thank you notes. Make sure you have each parent’s contact phone number.
Game 1
15 minutes
When giving out prizes make sure that during the course of the party, everyone gets something, but don’t give prizes to everyone for each game, otherwise it spoils the fun of playing the game to win. The birthday child should never get the biggest prize, because although it’s their special day, they’ll already have loads of other presents to open.
Game 2
15 minutes
Have plenty of drinks on hand in case the kids get thirsty, so that you don’t have to go and prepare drinks during the party, especially if your games involve running around, kids get hot quickly.
Game 3
15 minutes
Be prepared to be flexible, if the games take longer than expected, drop one of them, there is no point in rushing, and it is much better to have more games than you need.
Game 4
15 minutes
The timings are all approximate and will depend greatly on how many children you have and how many rounds you do of each game.
Meal
40 minutes
If you are running short of time, you can make up some time in the meal, however the meal is not a good point to try and stretch things out if you have finished your activities early as once kids get bored at the table, things quickly deteriorate. If you are ahead of time, linger a bit over the present opening. If you are running late, abandon the present opening, but remember to write thank you notes later. For meal ideas and a shopping list see the Party Planner sheet.
Cake and candles
5 minutes
Turn the lights out - light those birthday cake candles and get everyone to sing. It’s been done so many times, but somehow still has a magical quality to it. If you want to take a photo, (and if you can, you should) make sure that your camera is ready and set to indoors but no flash (some digital cameras even have a party or birthday cake setting), so that you capture that candle moment when your kids eyes light up and shine in the candle light. Once you have done the blowing the candles out, the kids, who are too full up from tea do not usually want a slice of cake. Cut the slices and wrap each one in a clean paper napkin and put carefully into party bags.
Open gifts
15 minutes
If you haven't already, make a note of who gave which gift so that you can write thank you notes if you want to later, or personally thank the mothers next time to go to school.
Parents come to collect
Total running time 2 hours. You’ve made it! If you were prepared, a successful and memorable party was had by all, now all you have to do is the clearing up!
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