Once the song was over, everyone glowing from energetically hurtling into the middle and, in many cases, deliberately crashing into each other during the chorus which repeated three times at the end of the track, Josh switched the USB back to the gentle music that had played over dinner and everyone took their seats at the table. This meal had a much less informal feeling about it and Laura did not even try to encourage any of the girls to put their clothes back on, choosing to pick her battles in the hope of being able to get a nice picture of everyone in their pyjamas later.

The magic trick crackers that Samantha and Amelia had chosen for the evening were an even bigger hit than the Sidney-esque Barbie ones since each contained a small but intriguing trick along along with instructions to help the recipient master them and throughout the meal, the guests, adults and children alike, worked on being able to demonstrate their conjuring skills to those around them. The hats, in keeping with the magical theme, were metallic black with silver stars and crescent moons on them. Of course there were the obligatory jokes but, as a nice twist, the ones from these crackers all had some connection to magic or the supernatural, although no less groan-worthy for it!

There was a lot of interest in the ham, of course, which was the closest thing this meal had to a centrepiece, displayed in the middle of the table next to the platter of cold turkey. As Josh sliced it so that everyone could help themselves, marvelling at how tender it was and how easily the knife cut through it, Amelia proudly held court, telling the story of how they had watched Emily butchered, how this ham came from the same girl that the sausages and meatballs had been made from and that it had been given as a gift. Interestingly, Josh noticed, she missed out the part about dragging him to the bathroom half way through the show!

Hoping to capture the fun atmosphere of the meal, Laura allowed the camera to be passed around the table so that people could take photographs of themselves and their friends or of those across the table from them.

Several of the guests had brought contributions towards the evening spread and there were all sorts of different party foods on offer – cold pizza, pasta salads, regular salads, sandwiches, sausages rolls, both regular and vegetarian, sausages on sticks, dips with nachos or sticks of raw carrot, celery and cucumber, cheese and crackers more types of crisps than many of the guests new existed and of course Gramps’ famous cheese and pineapple hedgehog – something that no party, or so he claimed, was complete without!

Everyone, of course, no matter what else they loaded their plates with, made sure to have lots of Samantha turkey and Emily ham, confirming with delight that the girls were just as delicious cold as they had been hot!

Once everyone had their fill of savoury treats, they moved onto the mountains of cakes, jam tarts, biscuits, cream slices and all manner of sweet goodies, not to mention the desserts that were left over from their earlier meal!

Afterwards, the children asked if they could go outside to play in the snow again and the adults agreed on the condition that they did not play so wildly that they made themselves sick. Wanting to make sure she got a chance to have fun too, Gram and Gramps insisted that Laura go out with the kids while they, Josh Martin cleared up.

Rather than putting all the leftover food back in the kitchen, it was decided to leave out anything that was safe to leave out in case anyone got peckish during the night or wanted a last snack before going to sleep. They stacked the chairs back at the sides of the hall and folded up one of the tables, leaving the other sideways around a third of the way down the hall. This was big enough to hold the left-over food once the plates and dishes had been combined down – savoury on the left, sweet on the right and the child-friendly drinks in the middle. The remaining bottles of white wine went back in the fridge to chill a little and the red was taken straight up onto the stage where the adults, other than Gram and Gramps, would be sleeping, along with a selection of glasses.

Next, they set to work pumping up air mattresses and unrolling sleeping bags for the children. Gram and Gramps had brought a small pop-up tent with them so that they could sleep in the hall and be in hand in case they were needed but the children would not feel overly supervised. They needn’t really have worried, however, as all of the youngsters seemed to have accepted Laura’s parents as honorary kids and were happy that they would be the ones to chaperone their sleepover. Rather than try to lay things out dormitory style, the adults decided that it would be best to just leave everything in the middle and let the children decide how they wanted to arrange things.

With everything ready, the four of them went outside to join in the snowball fight which this time seemed to be a total free-for-all, without teams or factions, just every man, woman, boy and girl for themselves, and everyone having the time of their lives! The energetic fun could not last forever, however, and gradually all the participants began to run out of steam so a mutual agreement was reached that it was time for bed.

Inside, the towels were handed out again and Laura fetched her family’s pyjamas while Miranda went out to her car for hers.

“Do I need my sewing kit?” Gram asked as Nadine pulled on Samantha’s pyjamas. They were a little long for the nine year old and Laura helped her to roll up the sleeves and legs but the elastic around the waist seemed tight enough to stay up on its own, at least long enough to get some cute photographs. Laura was fairly sure that her sweet young niece, who seemed to have gained an unimaginable amount of confidence in the hours since she arrived, would end up sleeping in just the top if not completely nude. Miranda gave Ella and Caroline their pyjamas which were light green with gingerbread men on them then went into the Ladies toilet to change into her own matching set. Rachel’s pyjamas were red satin with a red and white candy-cane trim, Merlin’s were dark green with an ornate M embroidered on the pocket in golden thread and Willow’s were pale blue and covered with snowmen wearing different coloured scarves. Amelia, Rob and Amanda, of course, all had the matching red plaid sets they been given the night before.

Once all the children were seen to, the adults took it in turns to slip off into the toilets to change with the exception of Mike who, not having any pyjamas with him, was going to be sleeping in his under-shirt and boxers. Clive and Martin’s pyjamas were the same as Merlin’s, with Martin’s being identical, just in a larger size, and Clive’s having an embroidered C on the pocket instead. Of course it was Gram and Gramps who stole the show once more with Gramps emerging from their little tent in a reindeer onesie complete with antlered hood topped with the flashing red nose and Gram in a snowman onesie with a felt top hat on top of the hood and black pom-pom buttons down the front.

Since he was the only one without festive pyjamas, Mike offered to be the one to take the photo and, although she was a little sad at first that he would not be in them, Laura realised that this was the best idea and agreed. Wanting to make a nice composition, she moved the table in front of the stage aside and put the crouching elf cutout in the middle then had the adults, including Rachel to keep things even, sit on either side of it, herself on one side of Samantha’s picture and Josh on the other. The children then knelt in front, tallest in the middle and working their way out to Ella on one end and Willow on the other.

With the picture taken, Gram practically shooed the adults up onto the stage behind the curtain where they would be spending the night on their own camp beds with wine and a tin of chocolates to share.

“Okay!” Gram clapped her hands together the way Laura often did. “Let’s get things organised. It’s nice and warm in here so wear as much or as little as you like. If any of you want to snuggle together while you sleep, a lot of the beds can be clipped together like this, see?” she demonstrated on two of the blow-up mattresses, “And if you unzip two sleeping bags, you can zip them together into one big one!”

“Can we do that?” Willow asked, slipping her hand into Rachel’s.

“Sure!” the older girl grinned. “Sounds fun!” Rob, Amanda and Amelia decided that they were all going to squeeze in together, as did Ella, Caroline and Nadine. Merlin was the only one who turned down any invitations to share, stating that he honestly preferred a sleeping bag to himself.

“Okay, looks like you’re all set!” Gram smiled. “Remember, if you get scared, feel sick or just need a hug or someone to talk to, Gramps and I are just in here.” She held up the flap of their little tend which was set up to the side of the hall, level with the snack table. “Otherwise, we’ll leave you to have fun! Do try to get some sleep, won’t you?” she chuckled, putting the clear emphasis on “some”.

Rather predictably, all the girls had their pyjamas off within minutes but nobody seemed quite ready to sleep yet so they all helped themselves to cakes and fizzy drinks and made a little circle of pillows to sit on as if around a camp fire, the smaller girls sitting on older girls’ laps – Willow with Rachel, of course, Nadine with Caroline and Ell with Amelia. They talked about how Samantha excited Samantha had been before she went to the kitchen and how beautiful she had looked when she came out the oven, not to mention how delicious she had tasted.

“Is everyone looking forward to eating me?” Ella asked, looking around eagerly and receiving enthusiastic assurances in return.

“Hey, they’re getting me too!” Caroline reminded her, laughing.

“You two are so lucky!” Willow sighed. “I have to wait until I’m twelve! That’s three whole years and two weeks away!”

“Pft, that’s nothing!” Amanda teased. “I have to wait either five or six years, we’re not quite sure yet!”

“Why?” Willow asked, a little puzzled.

“It’s some law,” Amanda explained, “probably to stop people adopting girls just to eat them, which is a good thing I suppose?” she shrugged. “Otherwise adoption centres might as well just be renamed meat markets! But yeah, no girl who’s fostered or adopted can be eaten for five years and we’re not sure if those five years start from today with the fostering or if the clock resets in a year’s time when the adoption becomes official.”

“Aww that kinda sucks.” Willow commiserated clumsily.

“It’s not so bad!” Amanda smiled. “I can think of two big plusses of waiting a bit to get eaten.” Willow looked at her quizzically. “First is that it gives me time to grow some nice big boobs first.” she explained.

“And what’s the second?” asked Willow.

“That I get to taste your yummy little butt!” She pounced forward and began to tickle the younger girl who giggled hysterically and wriggled off Rachel’s lap onto the floor where Caroline was able to roll her over and pretend to take bites out of her cute, meaty rump with its hand-drawn meat-stamp that was only slightly smudged from all the time spent playing in the snow. Everyone laughed and cheered her on as she growled and snarled, pretending to devour her little cousin before rolling her over onto her back and munching on her belly. Eventually, out of breath, she sat back on her pillows and Rachel lifted Willow back up onto her lap.

“Hey, have you even given a blow-job?” Amelia asked Rachel.

“Maybe!” The teen giggled, blushing a little.

“What about you?” Amelia turned to Amanda.

“I’ve been living in a group foster home!” the red-head giggled. “How do you think I ended up with all the boys’ sweets as well as my own?” The older girls all giggled.

“I never have!” Caroline announced, a little sadly. “And I’m gonna cook in two weeks so I probably won’t ever get the chance to!”

“Oh no!” Amelia shook her head, standing up. “We can’t have that! Come on, let’s change that!”

“But how…?” Caroline asked, trailing off as Nadine obligingly slipped off her lap and Amelia reached a hand down to help her up.

“Rob, Merlin, we need your help!” Amelia announced imperiously, standing Caroline in the middle of the circle and ordering the slightly bewildered boys to stand either side of her. “Okay, boys,” she instructed, “I want you to keep swapping places and… let me see…” She spotted a pair of pyjama trousers that belonged either to Caroline or Ella and tied them over Caroline’s eyes as a blindfold. “Can you see anything?” She waved her hand in front of her naked friend’s face to test and Caroline confirmed that she could not. “Perfect!” Amelia grinned, very much enjoying her role as instigator and Mistress of Ceremonies. “Get down on your knees and close your eyes then when you say stop, the boys have to stop moving and whichever one is closest in front of you, that’s the one you’re gonna blow, okay?” Caroline nodded, nervous but excited. “Don’t worry!” Amelia assured both nervous-looking boys. “We’ll make sure you both get well seen to!” Unlike the girls, Merlin and Rob had both kept their pyjamas on but, at Amelia’s orders, they both removed their trousers, revealing their erect young penises, and began to move in a circle, changing direction every so often and sometimes going in opposite directions and passing each other so that Caroline would have no way of guessing who was where.


To be continued...