Parrrtayyyy

We went to S's party today - apparently she is 5 - I don't really see how this can be because I have a very strong picture of her in my head and she is most definitely 3. Not only is she 3, but it was just last week that she and D and F were using our red rug as some kind of blanket and giggling. And yesterday that she was telling me in my kitchen about her ice-cream scoop invention. Surely it must be so.

We didn't get up till nearly 10, what with it being Saturday and all. I wrapped S's prezzie, F had a quick breakfast and we both had 10-minute baths, got ready and went. It was a beautiful day as we set off, and we caught a train fairly quickly. At Brighton we met up with a few other people from MMs and got our next train. F got a bit arsey and wanted to only sit with me and no other people - well that's not really how public transport works. Eventually we found a seating solution that worked OK, thanks to kind E. At the other end, it was suddenly a lot colder than when we had set out. I popped into a shop to get a bit of snackage, anticipating a lack of vegan food (wrong!) at the party.

When we arrived, the hall looked great - absolutely covered with pictures of the birthday girl at different ages (including a just-born one with her mum which was lovely). And a table laid out with party food that was all very pretty, plus disco lights to F's delight. I think it was one of the best children's parties that I've been to, in that it was fun and not over-organized and it seemed to me that all the kids had a good time, without any major upsets. F certainly had a good time, as did I, and the birthday girl was clearly enjoying the whole thing immensely and was very happy. I managed to find time to chat to quite a few people too, and drink tea, and enjoy the ritual asking Em 'how are you?' etc. F wasn't at her most social and didn't interact much with other children, but nevertheless completely enjoyed doing her own thing and at one point, running around with the group. She enjoyed recognizing some of the music too, and having her face painted, dancing and eating 5 ham sandwiches in a row, waving the ham at me and saying 'this is made from a Wilbur' (*rolls eyes*).

E and I were on tenterhooks worrying that someone was going to knock the cake over and that, worst of all, it might be one of our children that did it. In the end we decided that it might be best just to give A, who was taking pictures of it, a little push, to get it over with. Fortunately, we didn't need to take such drastic measures, as N appeared with the matches and it was time to sing Happy Birthday to S.

Having largely ignored her peers all afternoon, F finally made a friend at the end of the day - an elderly lady at the station as we waited for our train back, who she decided was her 'imaginary Aunt Laura'. She then insisted that, instead of sitting with our MMs friends on the train, we had to sit with this lady, so we did (I'm all about the 'yes' at the moment!), and found out her real name was Mary, which is a nice name for an imaginary Aunt Laura, and she gave her age as 10 - F was sceptical. When they got off at Hove, we were able to go and sit with E and everyone again, which was nice for me. By this time F had decided the lady's husband was 'Uncle Laura'.