Birthday party

A lot of the time being a parent feels like being flung out of a catapult at speed. You get up, hurtle through the day and before you know where you are - splat - you're exhausted and semi-conscious and somehow it is midnight when you are certain that it was only noon the last time you checked your watch a moment ago. Some days it is really hard work and other days it is a hell of a lot of fun. Today was the latter.

Today was our colleague, Paulo's, daughter Marisa's first birthday. Phil, Michael and I were invited to a little party that Paulo and his partner, Regina, threw for her. In total there were 9 adults and 4 children present. Paulo lives about an hour from our home by car so Michael napped all the way there and was ready for fun on arrival. He adored all the attention and was squeaking away like something out of Jurassic Park whilst simultaneously trying to climb the leg of whoever was closest. I must have had a premonition when packing the rucksack full of all his things this morning because I packed a second complete outfit for him 'just in case'. About an hour after we arrived he completely filled his nappy and then promptly weed all over himself as I was changing him. Great timing, kid!

The little ones seemed to have a great time and we were very happy that Marisa was enjoying the little Fisher Price telephone that I had chosen for her earlier in the week. This was my first opportunity to buy a present for a little girl because for the last few years I have only had little boys to buy for. There was lots of chatter and laughter and Marisa had 'Happy Birthday' sung to her in three different languages (English, Dutch and Portuguese) - how cool is that?!?

One adorable little lad, Milan (hope I spelled that right), zoned in on me soon after he arrived and I spent a lot of time playing with him and tickling him. I had so little contact with children before having Michael that it took me a while to work out how to play with a lad of his age (he is 2). Tickling and tossing him into the air seemed to work well.

We travelled home 6 (yes, 6!) hours after we arrived, exhausted but very happy. Naturally, Phil took an absurd number of photographs so I will post some of the best ones on here when he has uploaded and tweaked them.