Basements and birthdays

For regular readers wondering where the hell I've got to recently, don't panic. Work here at Stantec Towers has been rather busy as of late and quite frankly, after all day perched in front of a computer, I just haven't felt like sitting down in front of one when I get home. I'm back though and in a fine spring mood. Not only have I moved to a new window seat in my office (allowing me uninterrupted views of the condos across the road) but winter's icy clasp has been finally broken by the definite arrival of spring and despite a last minute snow flurry yesterday, a snowless terrain abounds. Here in Canada, the arrival of spring brings two main thoughts into the minds of all men - barbecues and home improvement. For this particular male, it brings a little refinement to those two basic thoughts. Buying a barbecue and getting in somebody else for the home improvement. Previous blogs have mentioned our undeveloped basement and our grand plans for converting the space into a third floor complete with bedroom, bathroom, library/living room, fitness studio and a home theatre. Well, dear friends, brace yourselves. Work has started. We are fortunate in having, amongst our friends, an able fellow who has his own business in home conversion and renovation. He has bravely accepted the challenge to undertake our work for us and despite being allergic to cats, commenced operations a few days ago. Budget restrictions in the Palmer household mean that we are going to have to do the work in two main stages, but at least we are underway. I will endeavour to post progress reports, including photos, regularly and I will start off by eventually attaching a couple at the bottom of this blog to show what things look like at the moment.

At the end of last month, our eldest daughter, Charlotte, turned 7 years old and for some weeks now, Claire and I have been ruminating on what to do for her birthday. Children's birthday parties can be held almost anywhere these days and with an endless list of themes. You can have skating parties, bowling parties, movie parties and probably even a digging-a-utility-trench-down-the-St. Albert Trail party if you want, the options are infinite. Finally, after some negotiation with the birthday girl in question, we decided to go traditional - an at-home party complete with games and a party entertainer. Our particular victim was a chap calling himself 'Magic Mike' who promised an hour of magic and mirth, a gift pack for Charley and party bags for all her guests. Ah yes, the guest list. A right old minefield that one. Inviting everyone that Charlotte knows was too costly, inviting a select few risked her being ostracised by the excluded friends and Charlotte, being the sensitive type, would have gone into emotional melt down. Finally we adopted the airline method. Overbook and hope that some can't make it. This worked pretty well after we had whittled down the prospective guests into best friends, friends and 'I'd better invite them'cos they invited me to their party sort of friends'.
To cut a long story short, the day was a success, Magic Mike was very well received by the kids, they ate every bit of party food in sight, smashed the crap out of a pinata parrot and enjoyed a good old fashioned game of musical chairs. There were no tantrums, no fights, no sulking and a good time was had by all. The party queen ruled....