Saturday 3rd April 10

An excellent day...

First thing we were getting our youngest ready to go with his grandparents to spend a few nights in Sheffield... they were due to arrive at 11am on their way back from a short break in Kettlewell.

Just before 11 we got a phone call... the traffic was heavy and they were the other side of York, and were stopping for a toilet break. But they did eventually get here, and after giving an Easter egg to out eldest, they disappeared off to Sheffield.

I got ready to go to work... loaded my Curver box up with all the circus gear, slipped that in the trailer, put two unicycles and the 'two wheeled unicycle' on top, costume in the pannier, bag of balloons in the other, and at 1pm, I set off for Copmanthorpe via Bishopthorpe.

Nice cycle, took it slowly so I didn't end up sweaty. I got to Copmanthorpe WI Hall before the partygoers but the Dad, Andre, arrived with his three excited daughters, the youngest of which was having the birthday... and the elder two greeted me warmly as they had seen me at the Burton Stone Community Centre a few weeks earlier.

I got changed and Yinka, their mum, arrived, and then the guests started trickling in.

After 10 or 15 minutes, when most of the young partygoers were present, I called them together and got them sat down, with some Mums and Dads sitting on chairs behind them. I always start the show, if I can, with 'warm-up acts' from the audience... one child came up and told a joke, another just came up and didn't have a skill or anything to do... but got a round of applause for being brave enough to stand up. And then it was my hour-long routine... which as well went very well and easily. I, as usual, enjoyed myself a lot.

I blew up all the balloons as they had their tea, and had a cuppa and some sandwiches, and let some of the children have goes on the 'four-wheel-unicycle' before the birthday cake was brought out... which was swiftly followed by the balloon modelling show and workshop... which also seemed to go well. And bingo, it was 5pm and parents were coming to pick up their little ones.

I got paid, got changed, reloaded my bike trailer and cycled home. I'd asked Richard at Country Fresh earlier if he'd like to leave me a box of compostables out for me... and yes, it was waiting so I popped that on my rack, between the peacock feathers and the bag of balloons. I then cycled past Freshways and they had some bread, tomatoes and 5 litres of out of date Cranberry Juice... however, all this was a tad difficult to load up and cycle home, but I'm not a circus performer for nothing, and things got balanced precariously but safely on the crossbar and handlebars, and all came home in one fell swoop... to coin a phrase!

When I got in, Gill was by herself. Our eldest was having a sleepover with our friends in Heslington, Simon and Melody and their son, and tomorrow, Simon is taking them both to the East coast to go fossil hunting. So... tonight was the first time in 12 years that we'd had a night in our house with no children. So.... we watched some telly, had a nice stir fry with fresh shi-take mushrooms from the garden, and a game of Scrabble, which was close right up til the end... but I just won by 10 points.