So I’ve covered the types of kid birthday parties I enjoy. But what’s my least favorite kind, you ask? Holy hell, it is the kind where you just get a start time for the party and no end time. And it is in some place like a huge park. At 10am on a Saturday.

You show up on a beautiful warm day, and think “This will be great! I can’t wait to see the kids playing Red Rover or that egg-in-the-spoon game!”

But no.

The parents are understandably busy setting out decorations and greeting guests, so everyone goes their separate ways. Since the place is so spread-out you end up wandering around the park with your own kids and no one else. No one tries to get the kids together to do anything as a group. You just wander around aimlessly, sit down to feed cake to the kids, and then leave.

I love parties at parks — and if my kids had warm weather birthdays I’d do them myself — but please, if all I’m going to do is watch my kids hang on the monkey bars for two hours, I’ll do that on my own schedule, thank you very much.

“Hey Jane, what else do you hate?”

Kid parties that go on for-freaking-ever! I think 2 hours should be the maximum. The kids get their yayas out, and it doesn’t take up your whole day. I kid you not, one time I took Mike to a party where at 2.5 hours in, they hadn’t even gotten to the cake.

The hell? I love your kid, but I have a life. Feed my kids some sugar, and then stop telling me how much you love the party location because you “can stay as long as you like.” It’s early and I need more coffee.