1.  Party 1 

2.  Party 2

3.  Party 3

A two party day. On the calendar, it looks so achievable. The Nursery Party was at 1030, in the village hall favoured by Nursery Mums.  The Town party was at 2pm, in the church hall favoured by some Town Mums.  Party 1 had a cross children’s entertainer. A member of the Magic Circle, professional, funny, but bossy and hostile, obsessed with his line. “Don’t come in front of it. Don’t put your hands on it. Don’t move the line.” As far as I could tell he needed the children behind the line because, occasionally, he pulled his hat down over his eyes and moved around blind.  Er.. strike the hat pulling kiddo - this is a 4th birthday party and they’ve just feasted on sugar. He told Son 1 off for playing with the whoopee cushion Son 2 aged 21 m won in pass the parcel during his magic show. Imagine how well that went down with the mother who thinks her child should colour over the lines to show he’s not constrained by groupthink.  

Party 2’s entertainer was camper, warmer, with a better hair cut and had the saving grace that he clearly liked children. Before the show Son 1 fell over so badly he ripped half a toenail off on his right foot and grazed his knees and shins.  Before I got there, the Entertainer, heaving in equipment and out of costume, had stopped and bent down to see if he was ok.  Did I mention we were early for the party? Charged around like loons, two children off their trolleys from Party 1, The Man giving a commentary unstilted by drawing breath on the perils of over-scheduling, and me still struggling because Someone Lost All The Sellotape on the day we had two parties. Pushing Son 1, oldest child on Mumsnet still in a Pram, up the road, miserable because I’m Always Late For Everything, we arrived at 1420 to find the start time was 1500. Hooray. At the end, I had everyone turning the hall upside down looking for Son 2’s shoes.  I’d taken them off and put them on a radiator. Gone. Nowhere. One of the children must have tidied them up in an unrealising grown up’s bag. Yes I know they didn’t fit, but they were the only ones we had.  Back home we found the shoes.  I’d taken them off at the first party. He’d gone to The Town one in bare feet. 

After the children were in bed, The Man and I sat out back at the patio table, talking, drinking wine and dunking bread in microwaved camembert.  A neighbour has a pack of three pre-teen girls who were outside till late, clearly having some sort of sleepover.  “How many children do you think they’ve got staying?” I asked. “Just one I think,” said The Man. “It just sounds like a lot more.”  Next Door But One, who went on a Business Trip with The MAn, was putting down slug pellets and bantering back and forth with The Man.  Michael Jackson songs wafted over from somewhere else.  The light held forever.  We might do that again.

1. Living is easy

2. Fish are jumping

3. Mummy and Daddy standing by

Son 2 aged 11m and I were downstairs when we heard little boy chatter and running feet upstairs.  Son 1 aged 3y 11m and his Friend. Up at 7am, and a three-hour game of pirates, involving every pirate we have, the Lost Boys, the Indians, both pirate costumes, three out of our four floors and the garden, the Scooby Do toys and all our Thomas the Tank engines (nos 1 to 8.)   Mother arrived at 10am with Little Bro and the dog.   Son 1 sobbed when Friend went.  Curled up on the doormat like a little woodlouse and howled his name.

Today was the only nice day in the weather forecast ever.  We had to take The Boat out.  I made a mighty picnic, 5 and a half rounds of sandwiches, three pots of fromage frais, two bags of rice cakes, leftover cocktail sausages, 2 apples, 2 boxes of raisins, one box  of sultanas and apricots, milk, water, smoothies.  Both Sons were, as usual, cranky and tricky with fatigue.  And so were The Man and I.  ”They’re so tired they’ll both be asleep before we’re out of the harbour,” I said. We chugged off past the £3m house.  It took me half an hour to get Son 2 off to sleep, and another half hour to get Son 1 off.  We were far up river, in a beauty spot.  The fish were, indeed, jumping. “You can’t drop the anchor.  It’ll wake Son 2 up,” I said. ” I can anchor off the back,” said The Man.  He did so.  I made coffee.  We admired the scenery, and chinked coffee mugs.  The boat swung round. Sunshine streamed into the cabin onto Son 2’s face.  He woke up.

Like Swee’ Pea, Son 2 crawled round the deck.  I didn’t have any suntan lotion.  Four weeks of rain and I still can’t stand to see sunlight on his little fair face.  “The depth is flashing 1m,” I said to The Man.  He peered overboard.  “Yes we’ve bottomed.  I can get it off if you want.”  “How?”  “I don’t know.” “Go on then.”  “I’ll put it in reverse and use the wake from these boats.” A great puff of smelly smoke and a grinding engine noise. The Man peered into the water again. ”No, we’re stuck.  Have to wait for the tide to come in.” So we cleaned the boat.  Son 1 woke up with the excitement, and he and The Man scrubbed and sluiced the dried seagull dung off the deck.    I dustbustered the cabin.  Son 2 brushed the carpet furiously with the broken-off corner of an M and S instant latte packet.   Eventually we floated off.  I’d stuffed that coolbag with food, and yet on the way back still suffered Son 1’s endless chorus of “What else is there?”    I preferred “Are we there yet?”

1.  Sounds like…

2.  Dropped It

3.  Sleeping over 

Son 2 aged 11m is a delight with his speech.  Son 1 aged 3 y 10m has a little blue ELC keyboard.  Son 2 knows how the microphone works.  I hold him up, he bangs on the keyboards, tries to push drum buttons, gets the microphone, puts his lips round it and goes Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh.  Son 2 loves anything with buttons, lights and noise.   He loves remote controls.  Age appropriate toys is for babies. He can say na-na… but we think he might be using it for “food.”   He can say “yeah” and “nah.”  He can say his own version of ”dropped it.”  I swear he came out with a pretty good try at Son 1’s name.  And when I was reading him “Mr Brown Can Moo,” I said “He can sound like a bee, Mr Brown can buzz.  How about you? Can you go buzzzzz?” He blew a raspberry.  Which I think is pretty neat.   

Son 1 played with Wonder Nanny, while I Got On.  I think all I really want is someone to Get On while I play with the children.  Both he and Son 2 were wiped out with tiredness today, but I couldn’t get them to sleep.  Son 1 has a friend round for his very first sleep over. We went to M and S to get stuff for tea.  I loaded the buggy so heavily with shopping that when we got back to the house it tipped backwards and bashed Son 1’s head on the path.  Oops.    I am such a cartoon The Crap Mother Who… didn’t strap her baby in the pram and dropped him on his head (pre-blog incident.) … didn’t watch her crawling baby on the bed so he fell off on his head… overloaded the buggy so her pre-schooler fell on his head…

Son 1’s friend arrived.  Dressed as a pirate.  I think I’m in the acceptance stage  now, after 17 months of the pirate craze.  So what if 3 year olds know what to expect when they come to stay at our house?  I don’t even need to plot to make sure Son 2 likes pirates too.  He can already do a passable “Ha-harrr.”   Anyway.  The boys ran off to the garden, where The Man, clock-watching till he could go out for a drink, supervised.  They came back for tea.  Which was a little pig-heavy: sausages, sausage rolls and ham sandwiches, but I did let Son 1 choose the menu.  I bathed and fed Son 2 and put him to sleep.  The boys played in the garden, and then came in for a story. Bath time was fine, they were reasonably quiet.  Cleaning The Friend’s teeth was  a joy.  A child who bares his teeth and keeps his head still.  Cleaning Son 1’s teeth was wretched.  Mouth open a paper width.  Head helter-skeltering.  Stories, boys in bed - we made The Friend’s from our winter quilt - and they are now both soundo.