The party was a complete success and amazingly did not involve anyone suffering heat stroke.

Just like the average age in a wanky inner city Wine Bar, the temperature steadily rose into the high 30's. This made being outside only slightly better than the screaming and shrieking bouncing off the walls inside. At least it wasn't raining like most of our other parties.

Friday night saw us frantically planning for the next day's festivities until quite late. You would be surprised how much thought has to go into those little lolly bags you get at the end of the party.

You have to make sure no one is allergic to nuts or you can't put chocolate in there. You have to check who has little brothers and sisters that might choke on small things or you can't put toys or smarties in there. You have to check that every bag has exactly the same amount of stuff in it or there could be massive fights on the way home for anyone bringing more than 1 child to the party and most importantly you have to have Emergency Lolly Bags (No I'm not talking about a spare pair of Speedos here) in case you have mis counted the people coming or someone brings a brother or sister you weren't expecting.

But the one thing you have to get right even if nothing else is done right is Pass the Parcel.

Until you give it a go for the first time yourself, you have no idea what you are up for.

The first tip I'll give anyone who is contemplating a kids party is to use a Broad Sheet Newspaper like the Sydney Morning Herald, The Age or the Courier Mail. If you try to get out it by using the local paper or a Tabliod like the Telegraph, you will find that by the time you have a dozen or so layers on that bugger, it won't wrap up anymore. It's also a good idea for children to avoid any unnecessary exposure to the Daily Telegraph.

The second piece of advice I would give to any prospective party planner is that you need two people to control Pass the Parcel. Of course you need one person on the music but you also need a much more covert person to play the part of spotter. Skimp in this area by trying to get away with just "Mister Music" and you won't get past 5 layers of the parcel before things get ugly.

I hate to burst your bubble but Pass the Parcel is not as random as you might have thought it was when you were growing up. In actual fact it is a highly political game complete with crying and dirty tricks. It's not just a simple matter of making sure you have wrapped an equal number of layers into the parcel for each kid and then making sure each kid gets at least one go at unwrapping the parcel.

As you will see once the game begins, everyone is happy and excited. They see the first two or three kids open the parcel and find a chocolate or a toy inside and they can't wait until it's their turn to unwrap it. Then the parcel gets back around to them but the music doesn't stop. It might stop for the person next to them or the person just before them instead.

After about 4 turns of unwrapping, the tears will start to flow and the dirty tricks start to come into play. This is where you need your covert spotter to help you determine who "needs" to have the next turn. It's the spotter's role to carefully judge the emotional state of not only the children in that expectant little circle but also their parents.

It's a simple case of the squeaky wheel gets the grease or in this case chocolate. What's funny is that it might not be the child who is whinging but possibly the parent sitting behind them with an obvious "Don't worry little Johnny, you'll get a turn soon".

Then the kids will start to employ tactics of their own. Passing it quicker so it goes past them more times, passing it very, very slowly so they hold onto it longer or sometimes pretending they heard the music stop and beginning to open it.

Little do they know that every pass the parcel game is as rigged as any Ukrainian election.