just another normal weekend, right?

It has been pointed out to me, via Twitter, that my weekend hasn't just bordered on the insane, but actually crash-landed at high speed in Lunatic Country.

Friday night was sleepover night. Lilygirl and Meglet each invited two friends for movies-at-home and a slumber party. Lilygirl invited Football Nut and Basketball Whizkid, Meglet invited Shy Kindergarten-friend and the Spoiled Brat from Hell.

Movies were accomplished via our latest acquisitions - a data projector and screen courtesy La Trobe's policy of replacing its AV gear at ridiculously short intervals. With minimal rearrangement of the lounge room we managed to find enough room for speakers and six squirming kids with an increasing level of sugar in their bloodstreams. Add popcorn and home-made Choc Top ice creams (accomplished by pouring Ice Magic all over ice cream in cones, and trying not to paint the kitchen with the stuff before it sets), and we had a pretty good setup.

Pizza was the dinner of choice - but somehow we ended up with something like 450,000 leftover slices. Okay, I exaggerate - but Wuff is going to be taking a lot of pizza to work for lunch in the next week.

Then came bedtime. Ha. Ha ha ha ha. SBFH objected when we told them to hand over every single Nintendo DS, and that we weren't going to allow them to watch video on her laptop (which she also brought to the party, along with her bling!cellphone and DSi - I told you she was spoiled). Knowing it was likely they wouldn't sleep for ages, we decided to commandeer the home cinema and watch some of the shinier sequences from Avatar. After the fourth time we caught the kids running between the bedrooms, we threatened to club them all to death and they stayed in their own rooms.

Meglet decided she couldn't sleep, and by 1 am was in need of soft toy comfort. In the middle of the night moved to the hallway with pillow, doona and giant teddybear. I found her there at 3 am, when Lilygirl woke me up complaining that she felt sick.

Shy Kindergarten-friend had to go home very early the next morning - guess whose job it was to wake her up and get her ready to go? I tried to do that quietly, but stepping over Meglet's head was always a dodgy proposition. Meglet bounced up, entirely too awake for my delicate sensibilities, and woke up SBFH. They in turn decided it was time the other three woke up, and chaos returned.

Wuff - who got about an hour's more sleep than I did - offered to play tag with me for the day's planned activities. He took them swimming while I stayed home to regain some energy and rest. At least, that was the plan. I hereby lay a curse on all telecommunications companies that let people call me yesterday morning.

Lunchtime was my responsibility - Hot Rock charcoal chicken, followed by Cold Rock ice cream. Yes, more ice cream. Dear gods. We also took a trip to the Brand Junction store across the road for the girls to select some new bed linen as part of their birthday present. That was a lot like herding cats, although cats don't normally terrorise shopkeepers by putting their sticky fingers all over the shop windows and squealing loudly.

Eventually they all went home - though SBFH left clothes and knick-knacks scattered throughout the house. They went into Meglet's schoolbag for Monday.

Time for a rest, right? Uh, no. We'd foolishly agreed to have friends over last night - one of them needed major moral support. As it turned out, only one turned up in the end, and we spent an enjoyable evening watching Keating! the Musical And eating pizza.

So, Sunday. Day of rest and recovery. A leisurely late breakfast, followed by a lazy afternoon.

Hah.

You see, the big birthday presents this year from the whole family were new beds. Loft beds. Double beds. Loft beds from Ikea, to be exact. And what's the really fun thing about Ikea furniture? It comes in boxes, and you get the joy of assembling it.

It's a special kind of hell. And we've been living there all day. Wuff's family turned up to help out - and you know how smoothly an operation can go when there's Dad and both brothers at work.

Yeah. About like that.

It's a special kind of hell - hell with an alun key. And excited twin girls. And helpful suggestions. Not to mention the entire new ecologies we discovered when we finally moved out the old beds and cleared away the archaeological strata there.

All of which is why I am hiding here in the loungeroom, surrounded by pillows, under-the-bed junk, Ikea assembly diagrams and the shattered remnants of my family's sanity.

And alun keys.

But the kids are ecstatically happy. Our new mattress is nearly in place on our bed. Then all I have to do is throw on a sheet, the pillows and doona, and dodge the falling colossus that will be Wuff finally collapsing.

I'm so glad there won't be another birthday for a year.