Zuleikha gave a party

On the 27th, one day after the tsunami in Indonesia in 2004, Zuleikha was born. And this year, we couldn’t really celebrate that at home – first I had to work, and second our flat isn’t really meant for a dozen kids and some of their parents as well. So we decided to give a party elsewhere, and on Saturday.

First, Zuleikha was drawing some fashion stuff in the morning – and she really has lots of fun with that one:

Another one of her presents was what she calls a “Murmelbahn”, with which you build a labyrinth-style downhill constructions for marbles (didn’t see the packing, and I didn’t try to look up an English word for it):

And in the afternoon, after some shopping, we went to that indoor playground called “Tiggolino” where Zuleikha wanted to give her party. This is what it looks from inside during the first preparations:

It’s a photographers nightmare with this mixed light you see here. But like last time, I decided against flash, so I had to use the cameras with relatively high ISO settings, and the prime (fixed focal length) lenses wide open. First, everyone had a quick snack and/or drink before the action started:

And the main attraction for most of the kids was a new construction – they called it “the volcano”. After some initial – ahem – hesitations, it took some confirmation of the brave ones and a first leap of faith to be really explored:

Then they hardly couldn’t be stopped to climb it again and again, and sometimes some of them rested up there for a top-level conference:

And every hour or so, we called them back for some refreshments. After all, what is a birthday party without a cake? Took this one during the “Happy birthday” song:

It was fun, and less stressful than I thought. No injuries except minor distractions either. I took all photos with the Olympus E-PL1 “Pen” camera and the 14 or the 45mm lenses, except the last one which I took with the E-520 and the 50mm macro.

Thanks for viewing.