DD1's birthday party

She's not 5 until September, but is planning it already.  She's not yet 'school age' but has 34 friends on the list already, and she's been wanting to add everyone from her gymnastics and ballet & tap classes too - and people think HEed kids are isolated! Pah!

Anyway, we're thinking about what would be best.  Our house is far too small to have anywhere near that number of people (plus extra when you include parents and siblings).  I could hire the local community hall, but not sure if I can be bothered organising that number of children into organised activities (pass the parcel, musical statues etc etc) and think it will be more chaos than anything else.  We did soft play last year, which was good, but I don't fancy doing that again this year.  Her gymnastics class do birthday parties (£120 for 20 kids for 2hours) but everybody has to be over 5, which would mean not just that DD2 couldn't attend, but also that most of her friends couldn't either as she's the oldest.  I also contacted her dance teachers and they do parties too (£90 for 20 kids for 2hours) but there's no age limits, which is good.  So, I now have to decide whether I want to spend £90, just for someone else to organise the party and activities, when I still have to proved the food and party bags?

I turn 30 next week.

I'm actually not regretting it (not that I have much choice, other than suicide anyway and I don't wanna do that!) although I had hoped I'd get down to a size 12 (or below) before my 30th.  It was always a pipe dream, but given the success of weightloss I'd had last year and just before I had DD2, I thought I might just make it, but it's not to be.  I am only a size 14, though, so I can't complain, and my jeans are too loose (though 12s are still too small).  I haven't been on my diet since this time last year, when my sister stopped me losing any more weight before her wedding.  I tried starting the diet again in August, and then in Jan of this year, but I don't have the motivation and just don't care.  I know I'm a lot healthier than I used to be, and have managed to keep most of the weight off (I'm now just below 11st, rather than just below 10st as I wanted) but I'm not yoyo-dieting, and I'm not really trying, if I'm honest.  I'll still eat takeaways etc, just feel more powerful (if you can understand that?) about NOT eating dessert/more if I don't really want it.

But, because I turn 30, rather than having the usual BBQ for all our uni friends, I've ended up inviting everybody and anybody.  At last count, we've 20 adults and 11 kids coming, and half the people haven't replied!  I'm just hoping that the weather is dry.  I don't care how cold it is - people can wear coats - but our living room is not big enough for that number of people, and we need to be able to shove them all in the garden.  Not only that, I need to tidy the rest of the house as I'm sure people will overspill upstairs too.  Our bedroom is strictly off limits.  My work room has a sofa bed in, and is where my mum is staying, so that'll be off limits too (though will still be tidier than our bedroom).  But I still need to clean the bathroom, again, and the DDs bedroom.  We live in a hard water area, so our toilet fills with limescale overnight, which looks unsightly, and just from having children toys end up everywhere.  The DDs have too many toys for their room.  We don't have enough storage, and everything ends up in a big mess in the middle.  I need to get tidying.  And then do downstairs again.  It was tidy this morning, but then the kids woke up.  And I need to do the kitchen.  Well, really, I need to get DH to do it.  He's paranoid about identity theft, so we have bags of 'shredding' that he hasn't yet shredded.  That all needs to be moved before the w/e.  Finally, I need to make sure I'm totally up to date with the clothes washing, so that I can take the clothes horses, that permanently live in the kitchen, out of the way to allow space to the back door and the garden.  Our kitchen is also in the middle of being redecorated, though I started last summer, so I'm not even attempting to finish before the weekend.

But as I genuinely do have all of those things to do, I really should get to it.  I haven't even mentioned yet all the HE-type things we're, and DD1 doing gymnastics still, and she's now started Ballet and Tap, got moved up a class and she will be in a show in October, and we're looking for swimming lessons for her too.  DD2 is a proper little girl now, talking more and more (she's been walking ages).  It may not be before the BBQ, but I will write more next time.  Oh, and about the various books I've been reading, some of which are good, some not-so-good.  I still need to review all them.  And library books.  Last week, DD1 read Cinderella all by herself.  This weeks she has taken Little Red Riding Hood (and read that herself) and The Emperor's New Clothes.

Clearly I've failed...

... on the previous post's promise of posting more, given that was in January, and it is now May.  In my meagre defence, I have kept up fairly well with my family's blog even though my laptop died.  It took a month to decide upon and get a new one, which in turn only last 2 weeks before the hard disk died.  Today it has been returned, with new hard disk, so I'm finally back.