The Tots100 Summer Party

Last Friday we went down the road to Hove for the Tots100 Summer Party at Zippo's Circus. It was my first blogging event, and I was rather nervous. It didn't help that we made a stop to purchase a car seat on the way over which took a lot longer than we expected, and so we were among the last to arrive. The children were thrilled when we signed in and they were given some light up plastic toys, my husband was thrilled to discover that we could eat as much food from the snack van as we liked, including candy floss and popcorn, and I was thrilled when several people came to me and actually greeted me by name, having recognised me from my photo! Stuffed with junk food, we were taken inside the tent and seated at the ringside for a quick introduction to the circus. We met one of the horses, and learned a bit about how the budgies are trained for the show.

Then we were taken out the back to see the rest of the horses, while some of the older children were having a go at juggling and having their faces painted. I'd been hoping for a go on the trapeze but unfortunately it was far too popular, which is probably a good thing on reflection.

Then we took our seats for the circus. It was at around this point that I realised our children (3 1/2 and 1) are probably a bit too little for a circus. Although Harry was able to understand what was going on, he insisted on sitting on my knee and he wouldn't keep still. He refused to eat any of the snacks that we had, and he was also fascinated by the toilets in a caravan, necessitating repeated trips. Mia was tired, and wriggled about whinging, only falling into the exhausted, quiet state about five minutes before the show finished. As a consequence unfortunately I have no photographs of the show!

Harry loved the clowns, he was in hysterics at the slapstick humour when the clown fell about on the trampoline. Personally I was fascinated by the performing budgies and amazed at the limbo dancers. The grand finale was stuntmen on motorbikes riding around and upside down inside a metal globe, and this certainly caught Harry's attention. There were plenty of different things to see, and it had a very traditional feel to it, with circus acts like juggling and the trapeze.

Perhaps we will wait a few years before we attempt a circus again, but we still had a really fun day out. Thanks to Tots100 for organising it and to Zippo's Circus for making us so welcome.