As it lifts higher and higher, I’m considering throwing myself over an 8ft hedge to catch the anchor

The older Mini Munchkin and I were counting leaves in the garden when her baby sister’s big birthday balloon broke anchor and sailed away.

It was a giant “1″ and Ada, who is the boss of us all, had taken a liking to it. So, to give Mammy and Daddy a break from her tornadoes of energy and allow them have a demand-free cup of tea and a chance to catch up, I had taken her off on an early evening jaunt through their terraced garden.

The ribbons attached to the multicoloured anchor of Ellen’s birthday balloon were entwined in her little hand as it bounced and bumped in Ada’s wake.

I’m very comfortable embracing my inner child, so as we wandered along we talked to the “flowlies” and promised we would water them again “tomowwo” if they were “thirsty”. We then crossed the magic path between the fuchsia bushes and azaleas to wave a “hello fairies” and a “hello elves” to the miniature garden ornaments secreted here and there under the potpourri of hydrangeas and rhododendrons, hedges and shrubs.

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Once the garden residents were sternly told that it was bedtime, we set off across the driveway and climbed up the steep hill to the slide.

It is only steep because Ada is a small person of two years vintage and Gaggy is a small person of much more vintage and that’s not only wine. I also happened to be wearing wedged sandals – our adventure was unplanned – that could have easily caused a little accident if caution didn’t prevail. Wedges are about as far as this ageing chica goes these days. I find the image of crowded hospital emergency departments provide a brilliant deterrent for the lure of my Imelda Marcos stash of killer heels.

Thus phase two of our travels with Ellen’s first birthday balloon continued.

“Let’s have 20 slides this time,” I say.

I’m thinking that will give her Mammy and Daddy enough time to ask each other their names and if anything interesting had occurred in their lives since having two small children and surviving a pandemic and a house purchase, all within three years.

“Twenty slides, Gaggy,” Ada replies.

She pauses to consider the proposal.

“Okayyyy.”

Ada’s okay isn’t just any old okay.

Her okays – and there are a lot of them – are like a kite with a curving long tail. (That is opposed to a big long balloon with an escaping tail.)

And talking about the same helium-infused mini-airship, I was feeling a tad tentative about the fact that its ribbons needed to be disentangled from her little fingers.

“Will, I hold the balloon for you now, Ada?”

“No...oo, Gaggy.”

“But it will be hard to climb up on to the slide while you are holding it,” I say.

“No...oo Gaggy.”

She is waving her forefingers at me, more like a medieval abbess talking to a postulant about penance than a stoned fan at the Jefferson Airplane gig at Woodstock in 1969.

Determinedly, she plants the anchor of the balloon down on the grass.

Up the steps she goes with the alacrity of a steeplejack about to clean the spire of a church. The confident little legs swing over the top and the first slither down is effected.

“That’s number one, Ada. Well done.”

“Numbeh one, Gaggy.”

And on we go… number two, three, four… up and down and back and over, until we reach the magic number of 20.

“Twenty slides. Yay, Ada.”

“Yay, Gaggy.”

Next, it was time to count the fallen leaves, a key part of our garden adventures ritual.

“Yay, Gaggy.”

There are mammy leaves and daddy leaves and baby leaves. Naturally, I’ve deferred explaining that the more crinkly ones are Gaggy leaves.

It was during a discussion about a particularly interesting baby leaf that a frisson of wind pirouetted through the garden and suddenly our balloon was lifting anchor.

“Wow,” I say, stupidly thinking that gravity would win.

But it is up, up and away for Ellen’s birthday balloon as I frantically race across the garden in my three-inch wedged sandals.

“Gaggy, get the blune, Gaggy.”

As it lifts higher and higher over the west Cork sky, I’m seriously considering throwing myself over an eight-foot hedge in a brave bid to catch the anchor.

Fortunately, the memory of the challenges faced by Mr Carl Fredricksen in Up, the 2009 Disney film, stopped me in my tracks. After all, there are easier ways of travelling to South America.