Wednesday 1 January 2014

New Year's Eve party? Don't be daft; I'm a parent.

Fireworks

This year we didn't even pretend to go through the motions of staying up to see in the new year. We didn't watch any New Year's Eve specific TV. We didn't countdown. The girls, now 7 and 5, went to bed at 7.30pm. We wandered up to bed at around 11.30, only late because we had been independently pottering around on the Internet doing various jobs, reading up on news, shopping for hotel rooms and 2014 mini breaks.

When I was just dropping off to sleep, I heard the start of the fireworks and my only thought was, "so it's midnight then".

When I was in my teens and early twenties, New Year's Eve was a big deal. A HUGE deal. It was a special night when you got to dress up in your absolute best gear, dance the night away, drink slightly too much, and still end up in a beautifully romantic pose, at midnight, kissing the man of your dreams.

Of course that view was entirely the product of watching Sleepless in Seattle and similar films and has never ever, in my experience, translated to real life.

Truth be told, I can count the number of New Years Eve 'parties' that I have been invited to in my entire life on one hand. Not one of them was in a posh hotel in New York. Not one of them was in a posh hotel...

You'd be right if you conclude that I am fairly bitter about the whole event. These days; even if I had an invite; going to a New Years Eve party would involve overnight babysitters, and having stayed up so late I'd feel jet lagged for the next week whilst desperately trying to catch up on the lost sleep.

So it would appear that the ship containing my invite to the sort of New Year's Eve party that Meg Ryan would approve of has well and truly sailed.

Is the New Years Eve Big Event purely the domain of child-free singletons? Or are there parents all over the world also enjoying the festivities?

What did you do last night? And was staying up late, if indeed you did stay up, really worth it? Do you have any other New Year traditions? Let us know. I'd love to hear from you.

 

4 comments:

  1. Hahaha! NYE party! Yeah right. I was in bed at 11. Woke up at 12, looked at the fireworks out of the window and went back to sleep! I used to have a big night when I was in my late teens/early 20s but as I got a little older it was always a bit of a disappointment - too much expectation (and ridiculously expensive!) so have been having low-key nights with friends for a few years before Mushroom anyway. Now we just can't be bothered. Sure that might change in time though. We did think about making the family friendly New Year's Day fireworks a thing, starting this year. My sister came for the day and everything. Then we got there and it was cancelled! Poor Mushroom was very upset. Oh well, maybe next year!

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    1. Oh no! It's such a shame when you get all geared up for something and then it's cancelled. :( I hope you get another chance next year.

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  2. I know what you mean, and I definitely felt the same when my kids were a bit younger - I remember feeling super smug the New Years' Day we were all up and in the garden chopping down trees at 8 in the morning, full of the joys of an early night... But now the kids are 10 and 71/2 and it's all a little easier - and they want to do something too - so we usually celebrate with friends who also have children. We did that this year - there were 4 families, we all took left over food from Christmas, with anything else that seemed appropriate, the kids all played man hunt and watched DVDs while we drank prosecco and played cranium, joining forces for midnight, followed by a hasty retreat to our various homes (all within walking distance of the host). Sure we all felt fairly rough on New Years' Day but we had lots of fun - so you see, it does improve. But I've never been to a posh hotel, let alone a posh hotel in New York...

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    1. Chopping trees at 8am! Goodness - I bet the neighbours loved you! :-)

      Your party sounds fab. Unfortunately our mates don't all live walking distance away, but it guess we could have a huge slumber party! :-D

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