h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

and I didn't actually maim any of the kids - including Gruesome #2 (whose party it was)

Today was the first real sunny day for a couple of weeks - which was a relief, it looked as though #2 could have her party in the garden. Just as well we managed to mow last night.

Zipped into town this morning for a few last minute things then back home to do the preparations. I had to bake muffins, cut all the veggies, stick sausages on sticks, stick cheese and manderins on sticks and make potato salad (including making my own mayonnaise). Then I had to hang up the pinata, hang up the streamers and make sure we had all the drinks and stuff ready.

It was a beach party. We sent out sunglasses as invitations and prayed for good weather. It worked

So, as the first kid arrived the had finally turned up home. He was putting finishing touches to the cake when the first two turned up. Soon the other three (they're allowed to invite a maximum of 6 kids - one couldn't make it)

We started with "cocktails" which was apple juice, with orance slices, cocktail cherries and those little cocktail parasols. They weren't impressed with the sugar around the rim of the glasses (the gruesomes thought it was cool - just goes to show that the experiences are totally different)

Then it was out to the garden to do a bit of running around (crawl through the tunnel, hop through some hula-hoops, bounce on the space hopper and then throw a ball in a bucket (which I was holding, my fingers are black and blue from that). For finishing (we couldn't make it into a race because they're still not able to comprehend that if there is a winner, there is also a loser) they got some bubbles, so then we had a few minutes popping bubbles.

After that we did ... ah, well, I don't know what it is in English. Töpfchen Schlagen. Basically a saucepan is upturned over some sweets (we used little stamper things which are like giant felt pens). One kid is blindfolded and turned round three times. They get a wooden spoon (melamine in our case) and have to tap the ground. The other kids shout "warm" "cold" whatever, until they smack the pot. Then the next one has a go.

Then musical chairs (which in German is called Reise nach Jerusalem- Journey to Jerusalem) which is always fun (lollies for each kid that was out).

After that they were all hot, so it was a quick sit down and a drink before we did some craft activity (typical German birthday party thing). In our case I had spent hours and hours cutting out little flowers from funky foam, cutting up straws and digging out wooden beads from my crafts box (which needs sorting out). We made Hawaaiian (style) Lays (leis?) Which was, I'm gratified to hear, a fantastic thing. Each kid had their photo taken wearing their sunnies and their neck thing, I've mailed them to their parents already. (isn't the internet fantastic?)

After that, buffet in the dining room (sitting on the floor) and birthday cake. made a dessert island (on a huge silver tray which he'd flooded with blue jelly) on which he'd sprinkled this gold dust my mum got him (edible) for a beach, and painted on some palmtrees and so on. Remarkably he found some fondant icing surfer types in the supermarket, so he put those on the "sea". The cake itself was chocolate with strawberry cream filling.

Needless to say he's in a huff because none of the kids ate it (my experience: the kids never eat the cakes)

After all that, we went back in to the garden to beat up my Pinata. this year a sun with a smily face and big sunglasses. Next year she wants planet earth. I wonder if I can persuade all the kids to dress up as Vogons?

So, now they've all gone, the garden is tidy, and the dishwasher is waiting to take its second load. I didn't have to throw out too much food (which is gratifying) and soon the gruesomes will be in bed, leaving me to watch some gratuitous totty on TV. Most likely involving something along the lines of and sweaty men with swords, or and stuff like that.

Or both.

Phew. That's it until the next one.

That sounds little short of awesome.

Especially the cake. Didja take pictures of it? sounds like a devilishy cunning man.

This year will be the Youngest Gradientling's sixth, and her birthday is the day before mine. Since we did the housebuying this year, Youngest is concerned that we won't have the money to celebrate two birthdays in the same month, let alone the same week, so she has asked me if I mind awfully celebrating mine and her birthday together (I said that sounds like fun) and if I'd mind awfully if we did that at either Chuckie Cheese or Peter Piper Pizza.

For those who don't know:
Both places are kidcentric pizza places. Adults can't get in without kids accompanying. The seating arrangements are cafeteria style tables, with over half the place devoted to games and video games. You buy food and tokens, divide the tokens up among the kids and they can go where they like and do what they like while the adults sit back and eat, drink and watch.

The Gradientlings love these places - most of the games pay out tokens which they can exchange for cheap plastic tat at a booth. These things generally last all of three minutes before they break or the dog eats them but the winning of tokens and choosing the tat are always more important than actually having anything worthwhile anyway.

So that's where I'll be spending my 35th birthday - eating buffalo wings, drinking diet pepsi, munching pepperoni pizza and possibly having a game of whack-a-mole or Sega Rally Championship, which will irritate Mrs Gradient because last time out I beat her and I don't have even the faintest glimmerings of a driver's licence. The important thing is that when I agreed to Youngest's plan she lit up like a pinball machine awarding a jackpot. So I got an early birthday present right there and then.

I wish we had places like that here. We have something sort of similar - children's indoor play areas (with Gladiator style padded climbing frames etc)

The one the Gruesomes prefer is a fair way away, they don't allow you to take your own food/drink (birthday cake is allowed) but it has trampolines and a giant inflatable bouncy slide. It also has no natural daylight and pumps out disco-type music. The closer one (that I prefer) has no music, not so much in the way of climbing/bouncing stuff, but does have large sized scooters, go-carts and air hockey. More importantly, they allow you to take food and drink, and their pizza is pretty good.

Usually we go to those places for #1s birthday because the poor little soul has her birthday on 31st December. But #2 usually gets to have her shindig in the garden.

It's cute that your daughter asked for a joint party though - she sounds lovely.

As for - usually I have the ideas and he makes them. We have some of his previous efforts on our family webbie, and sometime soon I'll put this party up too. (we do it that way so the family in the uK can look too)

The best one he's done was a fairy princess castle that he did for #1s 5th birthday - that was also the party which started the Pinata tradition for us.

(you can see them on our webbie if you're intersted)

Blimey!
You sound like SuperMum Sho!

I would have loved to have you organising my wedding party last year...


The Hawaiian leis sound delightful. I remember dressing up in a pink 'grass' skirt with plastic lei for a fancy dress competition when I was small. I had a whole dance routine worked out for it too.

I think that (oh and watching "Blue Hawaii" with Elvis ) started my love affair with all things Hawaiian.

I didn't find Elvis when I travelled there though.

man I'd loved to have helped with your wedding party last year - any photos to be seen, btw? (apologies if you've said a hundred times, but my memory isn't what it was)

And not sure about SuperMum, I try too hard to succeed most of the time (working mum guilt) but sometimes it pays off.

And just recently my firmness has paid dividends, I have been praised more than usual recently about how well behaved the Gruesomes are as well as mentioning what a lot of fun we seem to have.

uphill pushing a small stone with my nose most of the time, but... Oh it's worth it.

And I never thought I'd hear myself saying that.

Our birthday parties were similar to that (only boys' stuff in our case) and we really threw ourselves into them. It really was worth it. Even now, as students, my eldest met a friend from way back at the station recently - what did they reminisce about? The birthday parties.

WE also had a beach party once - in the middle of winter - we were about to decorate the living room, so we stripped it of everything and put up sunshades and stuff in there, painted palm trees on the soon-to-be repapred walls, etc.

What the kids don't remember, but I thought was a piece of genius at the time- about an hour into the proceedings I passed round a tray of drinks. When the break was over (and I never let them have much of a break, they lose interest otherwise), they were already divided into teams for the next game, because I had colour coded the straws.

The Germans invite loads of friends to their birthday "party" and then they just let the kids play as if it was a normal afternoon with friends.

Also one very useful result of my efforts is that the eldest two knew exactly what to do when No. 3 had parties - I was (a) working full time when he was small and (b) didn't have the energy any more by then.

So No. 1 organised the games and had those kids really sweating and laughing and No. 2 cooked them spaghetti (age differences are 5 and 7 years, so round about birthdays 5, 6, 7, 8, etc, I could rely on them to help a lot.

Also, by then, they had been learning about running their Youth Groups and had experience in keeping littl'uns occupied. Now No. 3 is a youth group leader, too, and they all run their own lives brilliantly.

They have lots of points of criticism about how I brought them up, but definitely not about our "birthday party" policy.

Awesome Sho, you have my total admiration



LSF, today has been really so many coincidences...up till today I was bidding on eBay for a DVD with Elvis in it and it was "Blue Hawaii".

I missed it by 50p

Had many coincidences happen to me today {see new journal}