I’m short on words and big on pictures this morning. Yesterday was HUGE and I’m still recovering. We celebrated the 11-year-old’s birthday at a local harbour pool (if I told you which one I would have to kill you – it’s a gorgeous secret that far too many people are discovering) on a blisteringly hot day.

Fortunately it wasn’t too brutal down by the water, especially in a shady spot under the trees. Unfortunately the eldest was barely in the shady spot – she was too busy partying on the water – so she now resembles a giant raspberry.

We kicked off the festivities at 11am by getting the kids to blow-up rings, sharks, dolphins, beach balls etc etc. I don’t think they bought it being one of the party games …

Around 3.30pm the last guests finally departed. Epic.

But let me rewind to when my day started at 5.30am icing this sandcastle cake …

Forgive the dodgy pic, I’d been planning to take another atmospheric shot of it poolside but … all the turrets collapsed in the car on the way there.

I remained remarkably calm about it. Ce la vie. One of the mums had offered to bring ice blocks to combat the searing heat so I texted her to take her up on the offer. We sang happy birthday to the eldest and toasted her with Lifesaver thingies …

Everyone seemed happy. Later, when we got home, I shoved the mangled cake back together and we lit candles on it for the immediate family to enjoy …

But back to the festivities.

Husband is the pied piper of party entertainers so he kept the kids amused for hours with water games …

 

 

The kids all thought floating around on blow-up rings was bulk fun, not to mention battling with water guns and thumping each other senseless with a log jousting set I grabbed from Rebel. Oh, and repeatedly throwing themselves off the pier into the water. That was a blast too.

Meanwhile, I kept the food up to them.

There were clam biscuits …

And jelly aquariums (which were more like non-alcoholic jelly aquarium shots in the heat) …

And a watermelon sea monster (I rechristened him a sea monster because I could only find round watermelons and you really need oval ones for a shark effect, it was also a handy explanation for why his teeth weren’t white – green slimy teeth were much more appropriate for a monster and way easier to carve) …

And my favourite … cones of “fish & chips” (special thanks to DD for bringing the Goldfish crackers back from the US for me) …

I rounded the catering out with a large stack of Pizza Hut Hawaiian pizzas. Those 11-year-olds were surprisingly hungry on a 35-degree day.

The goodie bags were a hit. I filled these bags …

… with blow-up fish, thong keyrings, fishy notepads, leis, Bounty bars, gummi fish and Hawaiian tattoes. But my favourite addition were the rubber goldfish in little knotted bags of water like you get at the pet shop …

Then I went home and made gummi fish & popping candy cupcakes for the eldest to take to school today …

Then I really wanted to collapse, but there was an end-of-year skipping presentation to attend with the youngest, who scored silver in the Junior division.

When I finally got to bed I couldn’t sleep. Way too much action was being replayed in my head.

So I’m a bit destroyed this morning. But Husband tells me the eldest was “tired and happy” last night, so I’m pretty sure I done good (aside from the giant raspberry thing).

How brutal was the weather around your way?

Song of the day: The Sugarcubes “Birthday”  (bless Bjork, she’s a treasure)