Competitions and more competitions.

Would you believe it?! As soon as I execute my plan B for the 'stripping in the rain' project, the heavens open in a glorious downpour. However, given the fact that we are all battling colds and have a very good reason to be healthy this week, it probably remains a wise choice to have opted for the 'dry' version.

My sister has received her 'camera pack' and work on the pre-party filming has commenced. It is quite difficult to strike the right balance between talking to the camera and just acting 'natural'. I have put natural 
in inverted commas there because it is SO unbelievably difficult to be yourself when the camera is pointing at you. My poor sister seems to loose the power of speech and turns into either a super-efficient automaton or a gibbering wreck. Luckily for us, my teenage niece is pretty handy at using the camera and has worked out how to delete our extreme embarrassments!

Today, my parents are visiting and the Volkswagon car is being delivered to the Wendy House for us to use in a 'high profile' fashion to help with the party preparations and chauffeuring 'Superpops' around. Plenty of filming opportunities! We might even end up getting good at it.

I submitted a photograph of Taylor face painted as Shenzi, the hyena from Lion King, to a magazine competition. The competition asked for a photo of 'Your best ever fancy dress party'. I love this photograph and I was very proud of the face painting which I really took my time over. Poor Taylor actually fainted on the first attempt from standing in one position for too long.

The magazine people obviously liked the photo because they emailed me asking if they could use it in their magazine. When I explained that this picture was from some years ago, they asked if I had had any other fancy dress parties. Parties, fancy dress and otherwise, are something that are not in short supply in our lives. I offered them a Murder Mystery party that was set during the French Resistance of World War II and featured such marvellous characters as Phil Le Girthe, Mimi Anjou and Frank Le Awful. I can remember a lot more about it now than I could during a telephone interview with the story writer yesterday, but hopefully I gave them enough to work on and create a usable story, for which I would receive a small monetary thank you.

Even if my story doesn't make it as far as the printing press, I found out today that I was the winner of  the competition and should shortly be in possession of a box of dressing up things for hallowe'en valued at £60. Not quite the car that my sister is a contender for, but it made me smile!