Happy Fifteen Years and Two Months Birthday BA

As you know, I was officially a 'fail' as a mother after the BA's rather 'lame' birthday this year. In my defence I must say that she had been to see her first major gig as a present and as she had to work on her actual birthday I don't think the lack of festivities was entirely my fault.

But now we are on holidays. We are relatively stress free since the JF left last weekend and after 4 shifts this week at McDonalds, the Baby Angel was ready to party last night. She had organised a sleep-over for 4 friends from her old school and I had decided that the 'theme' was to be 'Working Girls'....in the nicest possible way of course. I figured that, at 15, they are all now eligible to have part time jobs and make valuable contributions to society ( 'hem hem' as Nigel Molesworth would say).
I had planned a whole raft of games and activities on the 'working ' theme.

• Guess your occupation. (like Celebrity Heads except with an occupation on your forehead)
• Race for Work: In teams dress in a suit, run to a table, sort some files into alpha order then run back and change clothes with the next team member.
• Pack the Bag: since working in supermarkets is a common p/time job this game tests your ability to quickly and efficiently pack groceries whilst following some essential rules: eggs on top, no detergent next to fresh foods etc....points are awarded for speed and lost for breaking the cardinal rules.
• Explain the gadget: based on the occupations given to the kids in game 1, they must each select a strange object or gadget from a range on a table and explain how it is used/essential to their occupation. Points awarded for creativity and credibility.
• OH and S quiz. Kids work in pairs to answer questions on basic OHS!
• Maths Challenge: given that maths skills are important in many jobs, kids are challenged by a 'story' of investment and loss with the key question being 'do I have enough left for a pie and a milkshake?' (eg: I put 60% into short term investments and earned 10% then spent half the proceeds on a huge celebratory party)

and so forth. I also rented 'Working Girl' (I was trying to find 'Nine to Five' but it wasn't in our local video store) for us all to watch as a culmination of events. For prizes I had all sorts of items of stationery, erasers, pencils etc. I also based the cake on the BA's place of work.


I was pretty pleased at the way this one turned out. I used a golden buttercake mix in two 9" pans for the 'bun' and a chunky choc brownie mix in a single pan for the 'meat'. The veggies I made with fondant icing coloured red for tomatoes, green for lettuce and yellow for cheese. I left some white and cut it in rings using two different sized glasses for the onions. I stuck Rice Bubbles on top with a bit of buttercream icing to represent the sesame seeds.

Whaddayathink?

As it turned out, we didn't get to do half the activities as I started off the evening brilliantly by dropping a full bottle of olive oil on our concrete garage floor. I think I have some idea of how BP must feel, except I also had glass shards to deal with!!!!!!!!!!

Needless to say, by the time I had cleaned that all up and washed all my shoes and slippers which had tracked through it >:-( .........the girls were already settled in for the duration.

Himself made them homemade pizzas and I did a chocolate fondue with apples, bananas, strawberries and marshmallows.

The movie was a wonderful trip back in time for me and raised lots of issues over class, equity and even the workings of the share market and business. (What exactly are 'acquisitions and mergers' mum?)

At 2.15am I finally abandoned them to try and get some sleep.


I think we can now safely say that the BA's 15th birthday was a success.