Emily has started making lists

of people she wants to invite to her birthday party. I know it's a couple of months away, but already she's begun the countdown (only 59 days to go, only 58 days to go, and so on) and little scraps of paper with names added and angrily crossed out (depending on who's in and out of favour) keep appearing in her room. Along with lists of what we need to get (ballons [sic], keik [sic], etc.).

Her past two birthdays were celebrated at her kindergarten, which suited us fine, as we avoided having hoards of her schoolfriends (plus siblings and parents) descending on us for an evening. This year, though, school is obviously for the serious business of learning the 3Rs (being put to practical effect in the list-making and countdown) and all her friends have had parties, so she has to have one too. We went to one on Saturday that boasted a children's "entertainer". Peter Pan, he called himself, and indeed he was attired in the requisite hat, tunic and pixie boots. Unfortunately, he weighed in at about fourteen stone (several truckloads of fairy dust would have been needed to get him airborne), and the costume in question was several sizes too small. The result was that whenever he bent over he revealed rather more of his backside than anyone should have had to see. Bad Peter! Bad!