Snowball is underway and the tension is clearly increasing in the crowd

homepage | photo gallery: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 |

Before I began to write this I noticed a line on the 2005 review which said "With plenty of planning time ahead, Fun In The Sun 2006 may actually take place in the summer and involve some sunshine for the first time in three years." Hmm, maybe not then.

This year's party substituted summer sun for festive cheer and welcomed in December with the Christmas party to beat all others in 2006.

Initially 'planned' as a small scale affair the event eventually grew into something resembling a full scale Fun In The Sun.

Games on the agenda included Snowball (how many cotton wool 'snowballs' can you carry from one bowl to another across the lounge using only a small plastic spoon between your teeth), What's In My Drink (guess the ingredients of five drinks, each containing a mixture of spirits, fruit juice, and liquidised fruit, veg), and Lego Builder (building lego models quite obviously).

There was also a prize awarded for the best secret santa present that was bought for under five pounds.

Go on, you know you want to, get the straw in.

All in all there were a total of five winners on the day, each walking home with an exclusive, limited edition Fun In The Sun 2006 compilation of Christmas music.

There was some mild panic and fear concerning the What's In My Drink game until contestants found out that they only had to select the ingredients from a complete list of used ingredients, therefore making guessing entirely possible.

There was a surprising amount of drink left over at the end which suggests that maybe a few people could have bettered their chances of winning by tasting a bit more of the liquid.

At the end of the day, with mince pies consumed, crackers pulled, mulled wine drunk and presents opened we all headed into town for an eating/drinking finale at Birmingham's German Christmas Market and then on to a selection of the finest bars the city has to offer.

All in all, another success, although after listening to Christmas music all afternoon I think I'll avoid Cliff Richard and his like until next year thanks.

The proceedings were, as usual, captured on digital camera so take a look at the gallery for plenty of photos.

Photo Gallery


The winners

So that's the end of that.

Now, I definitely think that Fun In The Sun 2007 should take place in the summer with a fighting chance of sun, so...

I know this is tempting fate but book this in your diaries now - Fun In The Sun 2007 will be on Saturday 9th June 2007, and we're going back to the park. You read it here first.


And, finally...

As always, thanks to everyone for coming along and making it another succesful, fun-packed party (even those of you that turned up ridiculously late).

Thanks to Jen, Amie and Rob who added to the food selection available with cookies and quality streets.

Thanks to my juicer for not quite going up in flames when I tried to get the juice out of a parsnip - I wouldn't recommend it.

Thanks to Bethanie, Rob and Amie for being around during Saturday morning and helping with the rather frantic preparations to get everything ready for 2pm - and then sitting around for another hour and a half until everyone eventually turned up.

Thanks mainly to Rob for making the majority of snowballs.

Thanks to Bethanie for doing the vast majority of the cleaning up, even though I told her many times to leave it all for me to do.

And thanks to the neighbours who, for yet another party, didn't complain at any point.

Cheers.

James x


homepage | photo gallery: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 |

©2006