Percy's 8th Birthday

Saturday was Percy's 8th birthday. Eight is the age you can best get away with eating a bit of their cake before they do....

He didn't even think to ask what happened to the middle bit.

Last year on his 7th birthday we knew we were moving to France at some point in the near future, so it was nice to give him a big party in a hall with a bouncy castle and lot of people. It was a huge amount of work to do party bags, space themed food and decorations, including a thing you put your face.

Anyway I delegated the cake to Dan as I was doing everything else. It was actually nine cakes, (the eight planets of the solar system plus the sun -obviously) but watching him make and ice them really was difficult. I get you can't delegate a job and then tell them they're doing it wrong, but aghhh it's hard to watch someone pour sprinkles onto a cake with no kind of icing for glue, and then just wrap it up in cling film to stop them falling off. What I'm saying is I'm glad the cake job was back in my control this year. 

Its not the most profession looking cake but at least the chocolate is sticking stuff together.

It would have been tricky organising a class thing this year, because we don't really know what there is to do for parties and what is normal and how to go about it. Also our house here is not as big as our old house, so it would be hard to host something. We gave Percy the option of doing a class thing and he chose not to. I was slightly disappointed because I want to try and make friends with the other parents and it's a good opportunity, but I was also relieved that it would be a much easier job. All we had to do was have a fun day.

We got him a basketball net, because since being in France he has really got into basketball and goes to basketball club on a Wednesday when he's off school. 

So he began to day by unwrapping that and a few other gifts. Then we moved onto a family game of Taskmaster. If you don't know it, it's one of my favourite shows, where comedians get to do random competitions against each other. I would love to be on that show, either as a comedian or just the person who makes the props or thinks up tasks. It's a petty unlikely dream, seeing as I'm not pursuing being a comedian any more and I live in France. This is not the first time I've made a Taskmaster game for someone, I did one last year for an adult on my parents river and it was so much fun (read about it here). We've just got into watching the new series as a family. It's a show for adults, but they do a bleeped version with no swearing and our kids are now at the age where they find this kind of show interesting. 

I placed the tasks up the stairs with a medal for the winner.

 The first task was this:

You have two minutes to go round the house looking for an item beginning with "P" and an item beginning with "S". You get a bonus point if your item is yellow. You get a bonus point if your item is the smallest of all the items.

We went one at a time round the house with a backpack on to put the items into and then we sat at the table for the big item reveal. I thought I was super clever with a pea for "P" it must be the smallest item too, right? But then Dan trumped me with sand. Small and beginning with "S" but we deemed it not yellow enough to get the bonus point. We did a few more tasks including a team task: rescue the paw patrol from an ice block while holding onto you partners hand. 

It was all going so well until we did a more subjective task (design the most unusual but fun water park) and then there were tears because Percy does not take it well when he doesn't win, and the game had to be abandoned.

After a big chat with me he did do a good job of getting over his disappointment, turning the day round and moving on to enjoy the afternoon. In the middle of the waterpark task there was a knock at the door and a school friend came over to deliver an envelope for Percy. We all assumed it was a birthday card but actually it turned out that she didn't know it was his birthday and it was a hand written note that she's written in English, inviting him over for a playdate on Monday. He came back pretty exhausted it was 6 and a half hours of speaking french (we did offer to pick him up earlier!) I didn't get much out of him about what they did, they played some games ate chicken nuggets and went to the park, him and three girls. I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall, not in a nosy way, but I'm just intrigued as to how much French he's speaking and stuff.

After Taskmaster was abandoned we thought cake would be a good shout, and then we headed out for some more unhealthy food at Buffalo Grill. 

From there we headed to a soft play place we'd never been to before. There was a big hall filled with different kinds of bouncy castles and other inflatables, and then another room with a kind of adventure play with a zip line and stuff. But the best thing was that these two rooms were joined by a room with a bar in it. I've spent a lot of time in soft plays in my time as a parent, but I've never thought to combine alcohol with soft play before, but it is absolutely what soft plays are missing. I'd love a kids party with all my mum friends where the kids were playing and we all have a few wines. Apart from one responsible driver of course, who has to keep an eye on all the kids and parents. 

In the evening we got back and watched Percy choice of film, Harry Potter 2. Last year he received Harry Potter book 1 for his birthday, and is now already reading book 4. 

Happy Birthday Percy Jones.