I’m sitting quietly, writing this as my daughter and nineteen of her school friends run around downstairs in the miniature town, scaled perfectly for kids.

I’m safe in the knowledge that they’re taken care of, they can’t escape without being buzzed-in by the staff, and they have their friends to keep themselves company.

Right now, I’m in Party Room #5, where we decorated, put out cups and hung a birthday banner. The awesome team at Richmond’s Kidtropolis will set out recyclable cups and paper plates and send up the Party Planner to make sure they have your food order right, which can be anything from veggie snacks or pizza to juice or popcorn.

My favourite part of this place is that it’s so well organized. Normally a party with 20 kids who are all excitable and hopped up on sugary cupcakes would be an absolute nightmare, but this is perfect. Arrive, sign in, drop off your stuff, let the kids go wild and make their own adventures in the little town, give them a few slices of pizza, a cupcake and a party bag for the journey, and then go home.

I wonder what else I can get other people to do all the work for? This is great!

I had to stop writing during the organised chaos of the pizza/cake/return to play, but now all the kids are back to running around and burning off all the delicious sugar before the car ride home. I’m sure my little birthday girl will be asleep before we leave the parking lot.

The only hard part of the whole day is persuading the kids it’s time to leave!