Sounds like everything turned out okay after all. When it comes to kids parties, I was lucky in that my son grew up before birthday parties turned into such big extravaganzas. Neither I nor any other parents invited parents to the parties. We dropped off the kids and picked them up at an assigned time. Decorations were minimal. I never would have survived if I had to go through what parents do these days. A big deal would be holding the party at a bowling alley or the skating club. We always opened gifts with the guests-children always enjoyed that part-and played games. Easy peasy. I remember the first time we were invited to a kid's birthday party. Wine and beer were available for adults. I thought it was so odd at the time. :)

As far as other parties, I don't really stress too much. If it gets done, great. If not, no worries. My friends will have fun no matter what.

Skating and bowling alley were the types of parties we went to growing up also.

When I said I didn't over decorate I was talking about the pinterest party standards. If that's the extent someone wants to go to because they enjoy the process and are able to, have a ball. That wouldn't be fun to me. I have yet to be at a party though with that much detail. It makes me think of certain fabrics or paints that I see on GW but don't run into in everyday life.

Growing up, I had only family parties for birthdays. With my daughters, I had the first few birthdays at home, I catered the food and hired entertainment.
When they entered first grade, I started to have the birthdays outside of the home and they were only for friends. Gymnastics, swim. ice skating, amusement park, hair salon to name a few.
Shee, as you host more parties, you will learn what works for you.

Your son's party seems like a blast and I'm sure very cute !!

As for your question: "Do you pressure yourself and end up half bent before hosting something? How do you handle your party planning?"

I do prepare and plan in advance but no matter how well I do it, there is always a ton of stuff to do in the last 2 days, even the last hour.....

I think that's the nature of event hosting. I now try to get things delivered as much as possible as opposed to me picking up everything, but that's not always possible.

One thing I do is shower and apply makeup and do my hair early in the day, I refresh later on but at least I'm not starting the whole process an hour before guests arrive.

My 20 yo daughter, who is doing an out of town internship this summer, asked if she could bring home some friends home for 4th of July weekend and her July 7th birthday. On Tuesday she called to tell me there would be 11 total. For three nights. WHAT!

Half bent is an understatement. The worst part was I couldn't use my stash junk and shut the door rooms because people needed to sleep in them.

One more night and we are done. The kids seem to be having a blast and they are all great kids so it has been worth it.

DD hasn't had a big birthday party since her 16th. I told her she was making up for 5 years of birthdays in one weekend.

Dee, sounds like a good time with the young adults!

No matter what you can do in advance, at least for me the bathroom cleaning and the vacuuming (pet hair) need to be done pretty much last minute, unless the bathroom was cleaned and then just a touchup.

When my whole family came last year, I scheduled Stanley Steemer for the area rugs and tile/grout about a week in advance.

My extended family is pretty large, so by default birthday parties for nieces and nephews turned out pretty good sized. But it was always very casual, things like pizza and then wings.

We used to do swim parties, sleepovers or a trip to the ball game for a birthday party, no extravaganzas. Kids had a ball.

When I entertain the thing that never gets done is getting myself looking presentable. It's all I can do to run upstairs, throw on a decent outfit, comb my hair and repair my makeup. House looks great, I look less than wonderful!

We've been all over the board with parties. In New York we had them outside on our building's terrace playground with their friends from preschool or the building, then graduated to Peppermint Park, the old Rumplemayer's, the puppet theater and pool at Asphalt Green, and live children's theater. Most of the restaurants are gone now, as is the most over the top--- Jeremy's Place. Words cannot even describe the birthday extravaganzas at Jeremy's....the excess of the 80's writ large. After we moved to St. Louis for a two year stint we had normal birthday parties at home, although many parents came and stayed and we usually provided wine and canapés for them. In Florida our birthday parties were always pool related, although once or twice I think we did have those blow up bouncy things as I was always "winning" them at silent auctions, lol.

For home parties I made everyone tidy the morning of, and usually rescheduled the regular cleaning service or lady for the day before the party. With three kids, the events became very "old hat" and by the time our youngest was in middle school we'd just take a load of his friends to our lake house for the weekend. No decorating, cake from a grocery store (ewww, yes it was really awful but they ate it anyway), etc.

The most fun party was DD's 13th. We lived in Florida about three miles from a lovely condo resort with spectacular pools and water slides. We rented a condo for the night and had about 10 of her friends over (I had a friend there with me as well) and we brought the girls home with us on Friday from school, showed movies and ate pizza and popcorn and cake that night and spent the next day in the pools. We had it for two nights so our sons could spend the next one there and not feel left out. The only fly in that ointment was that one parent did not pick up her child until four hours after the stated time! We had reservations at one of the resort restaurants and kept having to delay them while waiting for this girl's mother--- who had no good reason for her tardiness and was very cavalier about it. The child was not fussed at all so it was apparent a common occurrence. That stands out as the best party because it was a lot of fun and NO work!

shee, my son's first couple of birthdays were at home and very stressful to me, but fun in the end and glad I did it. Then, we progressed to the fun parks, swimming, skating, etc. Now that he's 11, (where has the time gone??) the last couple of years we have just gone to The Embassy Suites in town and I let him pick 5 friends to sleepover and swim and play board games, etc. Order pizza and snacks and let them stay up late. They even get breakfast the next morning-so easy! Then parents come get them and no house to get ready for party, etc. I think on his 9th birthday we let him bring one friend to a Thunder game with excellent seats-paid excellent prices too, but, they loved that. Birthdays definitely get easier.

My friend's and I got together when the kids were about 9 and decided that we would not have big group parties after 10 years old. Only on like 13, 16, etc because we were all going to so many of each of ours and it was so much work.

In general, I am a psycho party planner. I get myself very wrapped up in details and as a result, I get cranky. Once the party begins and people arrive, I'm fine, but I'm not fun to be around the few days leading up to it. Just ask DH!

As your son gets older you'll see what types of parties he likes and you'll probably have a combination of at-home parties and "destination" parties. I stopped hosting the extended family parties after my kids were two, and just did the friend parties. My sons were "the more the merrier" kids. My daughter is happier with a small group either at home or to a movie and/or dinner (she just turned 13 and we went to lunch with 4 friends).

Also, this has been key to my mental health -- the parties stop at age 10 in my family. After that, my kids have been able to plan a "field trip" or a sleepover with 1-2 friends but that's it. Or, as my daughter did, a lunch or dinner with a few friends. Last summer when my DS turned 18 we did have a surprise party for him, transporting 12 of his friends to our beach house for a day, but that was unusual for a milestone birthday. Also, it was so much fun, we may do it again this summer!

I feel for ya. For years I went over the top for every kids birthday party. I have 3 kids. It's just the past 2 years that I scaled down. Sadly it was a series of unfortunate tragic events that made me realize its not worth the stress. Two years ago at my sons birthday one of the kids was riding a motorized jeep and he knocked into my dads girlfriend and her ankle broke in the worst way with the bone almost protruding through skin. We had to call an ambulance and her and my dad left in the ambulance together. I wanted to end the party right there but my husband said it wouldn't be right to the guests. My uncle left and went to the hospital to stay with them. I just wanted everyone to leave but my in laws stayed very late. My dads girlfriend had surgery a few days later, in a hospital close to her home. My dad said she needed time before visitors so I didn't visit. And 2 weeks later my father died of a heart attack. The whole series of events were so traumatizing, I couldn't bring myself to ever do a big party again. We just celebrated DS 5th and had burgers, dogs, and ice cream cake with immediate family and called it a day. He was happy and that's all that matters.

I can't believe your baby is 2 already! Happy birthday, little shesharee! Sounds like a great party, I hope I can be as good a mom as you!