Taking the “#&*!@ “ Out of Pirate Party!
A super succesful evening. I cannot say enough for the girls party planning skills. Especially Fran - the mastermind of what felt like an ordeal during the planning stages but turned out to be fab.

My sister and family were not able to make it. They missed a great time -
but I still got a repainted bathroom out of the deal.

The weather was perfect and the mosquitos weren’t as nasty as they could have been. The yard looked so fine...and it certainly helps if your kids have a friend whose parents are in the party goods business. There is no way I would have come up with artificial palm trees, shell dishes, fish nets, etc. (The only deluxe detail I offered was my genuine imitation actual size human skull. On the condition that it was kept in a location where no one would tinker with it.) It also helps that this same friend is an accomplished seamstress. She made the girls’ costumes. Lacking a pal to sew me a brocade bustier and black velvet skirt, I wore a striped shirt , eye patch and head scarf. The scarf didn’t last all evening. I don’t like that feeling of having my head constricted. Oh, and the tattoos. I remembered I had some of the high quality Dover tattoos.

Rick had a good music set up with a laptop full of iTunes connected to a sound system. Keeping control of the music is an issue, so the next time we do this we will have a DJ. That will be me. Having a laptop out where anyone can change the music is musical anarchy.

I remember a bar we frequented in college. If anyone made a jukebox selection that was not appreciated by a majority of the clientele, a volunteer would lift and jiggle the jukebox until the next record came up. That was the situation on Saturday nite. If I find myself in this situation again, I’ll spend the evening with the laptop...in my lap.

‘Security’ could have been better. A broad spectrum of people were invited so each family member did not recognize every guest. I think we wound up with some crashers. Fortunately not unaccompanied minors. But unaccompanied strange older people. But it took a while to figure out that there were a few folks that no one knew. A little creepy. Not like the Manson family or anything. Weird, though.

The food was great. Embot and Big Ed worked the grill. Rick (in a puffy pirate shirt that the girls found for him!) was the bartender. Fran planned all the details of the buffet, down to the salsa, pico de gallo and other veggie stuff that was homegrown as well as homemade.

I’ll be trying to upload more pics as I find them. I wanted thorough documentation! And I hope to have a chance to pose Scrappy in one of the big shells (a la Botticelli’s Venus) before they go back to the party warehouse.