How I Judge Good Parenting

You know this blog is about the mundane right. Ok.

I am not easily shocked. You could fairly much tell me the most outrageous thing, and it probably MAY get a raised eyebrow. Things like "Did you hear the state ALP has a new leader?" Meh. But one thing has continued to shock me year after year. It is the evolution of the lolly bag. Although now I think I becoming numb to it.

When I was a kid I used the gauge the success of the party based on the quantity, not quality, of the lolly bag. And I used to stash it away, only to pull out a lolly when any of my siblings came near me, and eat it slowly in front of them. Such was common practice at the time.

Nowadays, things have changed for the humble lolly bag. No longer stuffed with jaffas, smarties, cobblers, whizz fizz and red frogs. Some are rather upmarket! There is a whole industry emerging, solely devoted to designing, selecting, sourcing and theming the lolly bag, which is traditionally given out to departing guests as a thanks for coming to my party, and now you have to be nice to me at school, because i gave you a hit-hot lolly bag... or something like that. ( I would have been REALLY nice to the girl who gave me this goodie bag! - you can order these by the way. I want IN on that party)

Now, in our house, the youngest Woog gets more invitations to parties than anyone else I know of, including Lara Bingle. He is like Hugh Hefner. He becomes the party. He usually marches in, thoughtfully unwraps the birthday gift in front on the birthday child to show them what is on offer, then finds the mum to enquire about the lolly bag. All in the first 5 minutes of attending a party. If he spies julienned carrots on the buffet table, his lolly bag expectations dip dramatically.

Last weekend, Jack went to 2 parties, which is running a smudge below average for him at this time of year. Lolly bag number one was demolished by the 3 male Woogs on the way home from the party. I did not even get to see it.

Lolly Bag number two was handed to me.

Which does not look like much unless compared to scale.

Twas lolly bag nirvana. Yes, we would like our lolly bag super-sized please. And it was fabulous.


Now this particular party was staged next door, at a house which is ruled by a greek lass, who can cook. Oh and how she can cook. Some nights, I open the entire house up to let the smells waft through from next door. And when Mr Woog gets home from work he asks excitedly "Is that smell coming from our kitchen?" and I shake my head sadly and point to next door. But anyway, back to my point.



Looking good. Nice presentation with a lot of interesting colours and textures.

Laid out, nice nod to the health conscience parents whose kids have attended. Sultanas should do it, pop corn ok. Cute touch with the bubbles. What's this?

It is a lolly bag.............................. WITHIN A LOLLY BAG!

Snakes, Milky Way Bars and Mars Bars. Quality stuff. Not some never heard of before shit from Aldi. (sorry Dad, I know it is VERY good at Aldi). All in all, a well put together lolly bag focused on both quantity AND quality. And you do not often see that these days.

If you were born in 1973, your lolly bag may have looked like this.

But nowadays, bigger is better and biggest is best. And to avoid all of us Woogs becoming massive lolly scoffing freaks, it all gets decanted into an extra large zip lock bag and hidden. And when my girlfriends come over for wine time, they ask whether Jack has been to any good parties lately..... hoping I will take out the zip lock bag.

And I almost always do.