Aftermath

Today was all about TallGirl. Well, actually it was all about TallGirl's pal. She turned 13 on (I think) Tuesday, and wasn't going to have a party. So her friends at school decided to throw her a party. In our house (for complicated reasons). So, all the girls arrived at noonish - except for the party girl who was collected later by TallGirl and I in a comedy of gated community locked doors, no common language amongst grown ups (my Portuguese being as limited as her Mum's English) and mobile phones being thrown over walls. At one point TallGirl was locked inside the premises, with me and the car outside. And me very happy that I elected to keep the car outside despite TallGirl telling me to tailgate someone in when they opened the gate.

Anyway, in the end everyone ended up in the right place and Maria was quite delighted (eventually) that her quiet playdate with TallGirl was actually a full on party with streamers, candles, cakes, pass-the-parcel, treasure hunts, etc, etc. I over-catered. Naturally. I think we had enough chocolate coated goodies to feed the five thousand without having to resort to any tricks with loaves and fishes.

Mr B escaped most of the madness (initially by hiding in our bedroom and later by watching CarbBoy's basketball squad get thrashed by a better team). Later, after a truly fabulous steak pie (being complimented on my baking all day has quite gone to my head) we thought a couple of Modern Family episodes would be a relaxing family type way of ending the evening. To any parents who have not had "the talk" with their kids can I just unrecommend the episode called 'Caught in the Act' where the kids, you guessed it, catch their parents in the act. Tricky.... But CarbBoy copes admirably with being the only one in the room who hasn't a clue what's going on on the screen and why his whole family are sniggering into their sleeves...

And now, having asked Mr B to go and say goodnight to the kids, I think I'd better go up and stop the ping pong match that somehow seems to have started.

(And yes, despite being pushed and pulled a hundred ways today - including helping Mr B build an unscheduled non-urgent table when I had made it very clear that I was busy all day, it's been a good day.)