Homemade Party Packs

Since my girl started kindy, she's been coming home with party packs almost every month.

"Mommy, look I have another party pack. Can I open it now?"

and she's almost convinced her little brother to go to school because of these party packs.

"Look baby, school is so much fun. I have a party pack. You don't have because you don't go to school."

My take on party packs is it is unnecessary and yet another thing that we kiasu parents have come up with that creates yet another form of peer pressure for our little ones. Most of the time the packs contain junk food (eg hard candy which I don't allow them to eat because of the risk of choking) So the junk food ends up in my belly rather than theirs (which explains the expanding flabby tummy).

Anyway, my girl's birthday is round the corner. Recently she came to me to show me an activity on How to make a homemade party pack and said....

"Mommy, I really want to make this and give to my friends."

She even suggested some other type of paper we have in our craft cupboard when she saw that we didn't have the one required by the book. I told her "We'll see" instead of "No" when I imagined how happy she would be making and giving out those party packs. Sigh! You see, I'm headed for kiasuville. "Would she feel left out if she didn't have any party packs to give out" I wonder. Kiasu. Kiasu. Kiasu.

Since, I'm headed that direction, I might as well turn it into an activity. And so, we shall make our own party packs (its for just this one year only after all). (Boy oh boy are these kids headed for another culture shock when they go to big school and find that the party packs and birthday parties have been replaced by cane wielding teachers.)

I plan to make it an activity where she shall prepare her own homemade party packs. Might as well make it a lesson too. I can teach her about the concept of multiplication and division. (Example: "If you have 40 sweets and 20 classmates. How many sweets should each of them get?") She may not be able to calculate this now but she will certainly remember the concept and the lesson much more easily than me trying to explain it to her. But most important of all, I can teach her about the joy of giving.

So, no store bought party packs for us. She'll make her own. Then perhaps I won't feel so guilty about giving out something which I don't believe in. :P

Parents, what would you prefer your kid to receive in a party pack?