I Know How to Get Your Kids to Eat Fish!!

Edible Party Favors?

In my almost 30 years of parenting I have had the occasion to throw a party or two (gross understatement!!) for my children. I have also attended my share of toddler birthday parties. As Moms, we can be very creative in our efforts to make sure that our adorable tots enjoy a party of such epic proportions that they will remember it until their next nap time.
I have hosted backyard carnivals, hired a chain smoking clown (although, in my defense, his tobacco addiction was unknown to me until he announced in the middle of constructing balloon animals that he was “taking his break” and proceeded to light up with all the little darlings staring up at him in wonder), rented cotton candy and snow cone machines, made cakes of every shape and size and as the children got older I hired D.J.s and ordered so much pizza I think we single handedly kept Round Table in business!
But over all of those years and countless celebrations, there is one party that is forever etched in my memory. That would be the year that Jackie, one of my closest friends decided that goldfish were the perfect party favor.
It is just a commonly accepted fact that Mormons are in close competition with Catholics to re-populate the earth. The year that my 5th (and last) child was born there were 52 babies born in our congregation alone. Yes, that averages out to a baby a week. The year that our little “baby boomers” were to turn 2 years old, Jackie decided to throw a massive party and invited all of the little tots ranging from barely two to almost three.
The day of the party was an exceptionally warm, and by that I mean HOT, summer day. That’s just how we do it in the Sacramento area. The celebration was to take place in Jackie’s back yard where the children could enjoy her swing set and play structure, lemonade and cupcakes, finger painting, and a wading pool. However, this was no ordinary wading pool, oh no! It was much more than a place for overheated toddlers to cool off their little tootsies. It had become, with Jackie’s help, a veritable aquarium!
Yes, Jackie quite proudly announced that she thought it would be fun for these tiny tots to “fish” for their party favors…their very own goldfish to take home. So she armed the tots with little, plastic baggies and set them free in water that had already reached bath water temperature. As the delighted little ones swarmed the pool, Jackie gasped at the realization that the store must have sold her “sick goldfish” as many of them were already practicing the back float. She balked at our suggestion that perhaps the little fishies were not tickled about being dumped in water that was easily 25 degrees warmer than the bucket she had them in the night before.
I tried to keep my opinions to myself, (which is NOT my strong suit by the way), but as an experienced mother of five I could not imagine toddlers of this age grasping the concept of catching a fish and putting it in their bag to take home. What they saw was a pool full of wiggly, floaty, shiny things that tickled their toes as they stepped on them and brushed up against their tiny feet.
What happened next could have been easily predicted, but all of the following events took place so quickly that there was no time to avoid the inescapable. The time line went something like this:
Jackie sets approximately 200 goldfish free in a wading pool that is 8 feet in diameter but that only contained about 8 inches of very, very warm water.
The toddlers were then set free in a similar fashion to the fish. They scrambled into the water with their plastic backs clutched in their tiny fists, some of them teething or sucking on them as well, because as we all know, toddlers put everything into their mouths!
Within moments Jackie is horrified to discover that her faulty fish are not living up to their fullest potential.
Only seconds later a mother shrieks as she sees her daughter squash an innocent fishy under her cute little toes, while another mom announces that she has just found half of a fish floating near her baby. Simultaneously 52 moms are frantically prying open the tight little fists of their happy little ones and relieving them of their “catch of the day.”
I hadn’t wanted to be a spoiled sport so I had allowed my little Maya to play in the pool (before the first of the floaters was discovered), but due to the chaos and the sheer number of crying babies, and panicked mamas, I just couldn’t get to her fast enough when the gruesome discoveries began. Remember that all of this took place in just a few minutes.
By the time I reached Maya, I found her chubby little fist, full of HALF of a goldfish! Then I saw her little cheeks puffed out as she concentrated on enjoying the first half of her edible party favor! YUK!! I opened her tiny mouth and scooped my finger inside to pull out a partially masticated glob of what was once a goldfish! My child may not have been the only one to decide that it was a good idea to eat these slippery little treats, but I do believe she was the first.

I believe this is how sushi was discovered.

Yep, she’s still a leader to this day.
We all worked together to get our kids out of the wading pool as soon as possible, some of us scooping up two tots at a time, and carrying them across the yard where we hosed the pieces and parts of fishy carcass off of them.
None of the children took home a pet goldfish in a bag that day, as intended, but that doesn’t mean that some of the babies didn’t succeed in home a special favor.
As we all compared notes several days later, several of the moms had received very special party favors of their own just a day or two after the Great Goldfish Massacre when they changed their tot’s diapers…you get the idea.
Yep, a party like that is hard to top!