Nine

It's bedlam here. I nipped upstairs to print off some lecture notes and sneak a quick face-pack while the kids were noshing their tea. You know it was a recipe for disaster.

First Poppet decided that her pasta would taste better to the dulcet tones of Charlie's Angels Full Throttle. At full surround sound volume.

And now, while my visage gradually solidifies under a mound of clay, Poppet is bashing out a tune on the piano, apparently having forgotten how to plug in the headphones (I knew it was worth paying all the extra for an electric model...) Pickle-meister is smacking marble chess pieces around the marble chess board, the dog is barking and the phone is ringing...

Well, at least my blackheads are finally getting zapped.

But, you know, I got through another birthday party yesterday so I am surprisingly Zen about the whole Picadilly Circus routine. If I can survive sixteen sugar-loaded hyped-up crazies zooming round my house and swinging off the decorations then I can cope with just my two doing their normal thang.

Although to be honest I am pleased to announce that parties get slightly easier the older they get. I only had to lay on a moderately complex Treasure Hunt - which the girl's team breezed through whilst the boys were still trying to work out 'You go here to wash up if you don't have a dishwasher': silly me thinking they'd have a scooby doo about where anything to do with washing is located. I also made a fishing game having finally said 'Nuts' to the party bag idea; they get to 'fish' for a parcel instead. It's the French take on the old Bran Tub we had when I was little and only slightly more hazardous if the boys decide the rods can double up as light sabers and start hooking chunks off their fellow guests.

Poppet was more than happy with a bag-load of make-up and hair-colouring to entertain all her girly friends in her room. Pickle went feral as usual once he got a few lads under his cabin bed but the ensuing girl-bashing was mercifully short this time. Boy-Next-Door was quite happy to come and play referee with our much younger ones... until he heard a familiar voice in the hallway and realised his class teacher was also here (his son is in the same class as Poppet) and we didn't see much of him after that. Nobby presided over the Wii games in the basement so I just had to see to the death-by-chocolate cake her Ladyship had insisted on and the rest was all tea and biscuits.

Somehow I don't think Pickle's will be as sedate; I reckon I'm searching for a 'bring a cake and a wallet' venue come July.