My son had his birthday in lockdown yesterday and this is how we celebrated

Melissa Carton

It was a birthday he’ll always remember.

Yesterday was my son’s 8th birthday.

Back at the start of the year we had originally planned to do something during the weekend his birthday fell on with friends and family.

One idea we had was to try and recreate our trip to the Hobbits Huts in Mayo two years ago so we bought in some pieces to make it feel like we were back there like a fire pit and pizza oven but then lockdown happened.

Needless to say all of our plans for having a big party had to be postponed until next year but that didn’t mean that the celebrations were completely off.

Most toy shops have completely closed, including online so finding gifts to get him wasn’t easy.

Luckily Irish toy store Jiminy are still running a full delivery service on all their items so I was able to get him construction type toys which are his favourite.

We were also able to download a couple of games to his Switch directly which he was delighted with.

Treats and cake wise we stuck to small family run businesses with delicious custom made cupcakes from The Bake Boutique and treat boxes from The Candy Cone Company, both based in Dublin.

What contact we did have with family and friends had to be social distance.

There were lots of video chats with family and my mam, who lives nearby, even popped up to hang a banner and see Happy Birthday at the window.

As an extra special treat we pre-ordered ice cream from Mr Whippy which delivered right to our door.

All payment was done contactless and we wore our hand made face masks from Bella Agogo on during collection (you can see Eric holding his) but we took them off so you could actually tell we were smiling.

Lastly we had a quick dip in the inflatable pool (we heated the water before hand as the sun decided to hide behind the clouds) and toasted some food on the fire pit before bed.

All and all it was a lovely day but we did really miss having friends and family to share all the fun and treats with us.

Guess we’ll just have to do it all again next year when there’s no more lockdown and no more social distancing.