Showering my baby with caramelos

We celebrated Maria’s 4th birthday a few weeks early so we could do it at home and let the kids play outside in the woods. There were about 20 mobile kids here and I am either crazy or inexperienced at the Mami game, but truly, it was a lovely and simple event despite the numbers. Lots of free play and the ingestion of sugar in the form of sprinkles sugar cookies from wonderful Mexican bakery and the ugliest cake I’ve ever made. And unlike our adult pig roasts of years past, nobody got drunk and everyone was gone in three hours. OK, so the kids were a little tweeked on sugar, but I wasn’t putting them to bed.

Maria had a wonderful time. She told everyone she was turning 5.

Success.

The only non-success: The pull-string pinata I found at a big box party store did not explode and offer up that delicious “Pop!” and “Sprinkle, sprinkle, sprinkle.” I had to shove my fist into it and shower the plastic frogs, dino tattoos and chocolate Kisses all over the anxious, sweaty mass.

The horror and shame. The failure to explode never would have happened with the pinatas I grew up with in Miami, but not one Cuban pull-string pinata was to be found in Middle Tennessee. (Hello, any Cuban/Latino party store owner want to move to beautiful Nashville?)

Fortunately, I don’t think the kids minded.