teenage parties

If you have teenagers in your house, how does it go when they want to throw a party?

Our 16 year old daughter planned to throw a Halloween party.   "Great idea", I said, "dressing up; get out the cemetery (yes, we have our own  cemetery); , simple food;  lots of fun .... what time will it finish?"    

It's the word 'finish' that created our first hurdle.  It appears that  it is totally uncool to have a finishing time for a party these days, they prefer their celebrations to simply end naturally in a pile of bedraggled exhausted teenagers, probably at dawn.

I wasn't going down that road:   "Impossible" I pronounced, "you go back to school  on Thursday (they're on half term break) , you have to be on good form.   Let's say they go home at 2."  

Now I thought I was being pretty generous and laid back here, but we quickly arrived at our second hurdle, this time the sticking point was the words  "go home"!!   hmmmm ......

I won't bore you with all the details but out of the 30 kids invited, we agree that 10 would stay over but ended up with 17!   ..............  what can I say?  Times are changing, parents are no longer prepared to come out at all hours to retrieve youngsters (?!).  In the summer it doesn't really matter, they can all sleep in tents in the garden, but last night it was close to freezing, they had to come indoors.

I won't tell you that I was sweetness and light at 3am when they finally went quiet, but this morning all was forgotten.  I was up early, laid out everything for a massive breakfast, complete with candles before leaving at 9 for a walk in the forest with the dog and a girlfriend.  I returned to find a happy, chatty table full of teenagers, getting through industrial quantities of bread and home made jam, taking turns to play the piano, ... my heart melted.

I know that I'll miss these years when the house is busy and full.  We love that our barn is big enough to host their parties,  and when it comes down to it, does it really matter if I have a sleepless night now and again?!