Cocktail sausages and E numbers

It’s true: The first thing that goes through a young child’s mind the second they de-slumber is ‘Time to wake everyone up’ followed by ‘I wonder what I can break?’
The living room which you lovingly tidied with one eye on Gogglebox last night, will again soon resemble an Aleppo landscape. The car keys will be found in Peppa Pigs rocket, although I’m unsure as to how she could control such a vehicle with hoofs for hands and lashings of pig-puppy fat.
I have found my wallet in the microwave, my shaving foam sprayed on the carpet as daughter one threw a Star Wars foam party, and my 16gb data stick wedged into a granny smith. Much as I love my kids, I often beg them to leave my stuff alone and play with mummy’s personal effects for a change.
It is with this destruction in mind, that I welcome kid’s parties. They are always at someone else’s house or a neutral venue. The added bonus is watching a fellow father host struggle to contain being head-butted between the legs and being run ragged for a couple of hours as I make small talk with a bedraggled dad bemoaning his lack of sleep whilst giving a blow by blow account of his bairns eating habits.
Generally, I am left to clothe my youngest if the party falls on a Saturday due to my wife’s work commitments. She has taken to leaving suitable attire out for me to use after a previous party where I put the dress on back to front and brushed her hair making her look like she had just come of a 3-week military exercise in the Cairngorms.
Respite comes the second you hit the venue. In the last 10 years we have been to trampoline centres, soft play, houses, ski centres, safaris and zoos. Despite the cold, I have a penchant for a community hall. They often utilise the space with some well-planned party games. Many hire the singing Ana/ Elsa lady who manages to warm up the frozen kids with let it go and other juvenile club classics.
After the games, the kids generally run around like lunatics with balloons in a scene that resembles the Poll Tax riot before the inevitable paper plates and finger foods make a welcome appearance.
This is the first real test of the chaperone party parent. Despite wanting to relax and hide for a little bit, the offer to help is a 50-50 Russian roulette type scenario. If the answer is affirmative you spend the next 30 minutes listening to parents giving you a detailed account as to why little Jonnie should never be given a cocktail sausage due to his veganistic, gluten free lifestyle choice, or, if you manage to swerve waiter duty, you embark on small talk with a harassed looking accountant with a muslin on one shoulder and dried baby sick on the other.
It is this moment I find equally tricky. I am still unsure as to whether social etiquette dictates if I am allowed to sneakily shove down a sausage roll or chicken bite from the table. I usually wait to be asked but then miss out to the plus sized mother who hoovers up anything mildly unhealthy in the blink of an eye.
Party over, it is time for party bag roulette. I once read that guests at the Oscars often only attend as they have tens of thousands of pounds’ worth of goods lavished upon them in the party bag including watches and holidays. This trend seems to have continued in kid’s party bags to a lesser extent although the offering of a paw patrol colouring book and ben 10 pen set are non-too shoddy replacements. So yes, I welcome a kid’s party. For the parent its free childcare, the kids get to socialise and celebrate, and I get some great ideas as to what to do for my daughter’s parties next year. Just keep your hands off the mini pizza’s and turkey twizzlers. I have plans for the leftovers, although the cucumber strips are fair game.