As a party planner my goal is always to create magical memories for my young clients. In the early days of my business, this meant covering the walls of a garage with paper and painting them to look like a fairy forest. Or perhaps creating a rocket ship out of refrigerator boxes. Today, with the advancements in technology, global markets, and instant sharing it’s possible to make almost any fantasy a reality. Many of my clients expect just that.  

Case in point: 

I have a client whose son loves the outdoors. She wanted to create a camping themed event in her backyard. I started rattling off all the fun things we could do: setting up tents, suction cup archery, lanyards and survival bracelets, animal footprint tracking...Her next few words stopped me dead in my tracks…”The most important thing is that we go fishing”.

Tents ... check!

Lanyards and survival bracelets ... Check!

Themed utenstils ... check!

“Fishing?”, I inquired.  “You mean like those electronic fish that you can put in the pool?”  “Oh no”, she chirped brightly, “He wants to fish for live trout”.

Live Trout ... ??!!

Mind you, we were 2 weeks away from this child’s birthday party.  How in the name of all things in the ocean was I going to conjure up a fishing pond with live trout?

In less then 10 minutes my entire team was combing the internet, contacting their outdoorsy friends and calling local fishing ponds.    Within an hour we had our answer.  Our dear friend Pat had actually seen a portable fishing set up at a Cal Expo.  After a bit more searching we were able to track the fellow down who was in charge of the portable fishing ponds at these events. Although he personally couldn’t do it, he gave us the rundown on everything we needed to do. Nothing to it, he assured us. Basically you need 3 things: 2 feet or so of (dechlorinated) water, an air source, and….most importantly - fish.

The first two items were relatively easy.  There was a big, circular fountain in the front of the property that would serve as our temporary pond.  We were able to locate an oversized pond pump at our local hardware store.  The big issue was the fish.  Once again, a search of local pond stocking companies led us to a fellow in Calaveras County who farmed trout.  Little did we know, you can’t just walk into a trout store and buy 100 pounds of trout in buckets.  One has to have a license to transport live fish!  Fortunately, our new friend was willing to deliver us 100 pounds of fish the Friday before the party. Mission accomplished.

I’m sure he thought we were crazy when he pulled up in his truck equipped with what looked like one of those big freezer hooked up to massive oxygen tanks.  “Where’s the pond?”, he asked quizzically as his eyes scanned the property. 

“Right here”, I chirped, pointing to the fountain, as I bobbed up and down on the balls of my feet in excitement.  He just shook his head, as if to say, “city folks”, and got to work.

In 5 minutes he had transported about 75 fish from his truck to the fountain and was on his way. I’m sure he and his wife had a good long discussion about what a silly idea it was to put 75 fish in a fountain. But hey, we are in the business of making dreams come true. We’re used to people looking at us sideways.

The next day found our birthday boy in a state of ecstasy.  He arrived 2 hours early, and left 2 hours late.  With the exception of being pulled away for birthday cake, he spent the entire time fishing. He proudly baited hooks for his friends and taught them the finer skills of casting in a small area.  He was in his glory. 

So next time you think something’s impossible, just do a little typing on your keyboard.  You'll likely find it’s already been done.  To quote Kate Hepburn – “Nothing is impossible, the word itself says “I’m possible”!”