Shirley's party advice thread part 2

[stealthsquiggle]

...can I take the liberty of starting another thread, since the other one filled up?

Pissing myself. Please note that all my typos and lack of caps is because im typing out on ipod and cant be bothered with the shift button! I can spell etc esp if i was to have a website.

Cracking up about her site. I think she has a cheek charging 80 quid. And i thought iced biscuits were done by flooding them with royal icing not sticking sugarpaste on.

Did you see her baby bottles all drying behind her antibac spray or her bowl of icing mixed with her kids weaning spoon. Rofl. Im sure she cant have a food hygiene cert. oh and 'your retired instead of you're' and the book saying grandad ha ha ha. I can do better than this girl i can.

I think I'd find it way too stressful to be honest. It's fun when i do it for the kids as it's a couple of times a year and if it all goes horribly wrong, it was my cake anyway, doing it for someone else would change the experience I think.

Plus, as my Sister is finding with her hand-stitched baby bootees - the price you'd have to charge to make it worth your while doing it, would make them so expensive that no-one would buy them.

There is that too, Blathers - if I am making cakes for friends and family then when if it goes wrong I can adapt the plan, or simplify it or just bodge it - if you were committed to delivering something specific then it would be way more pressure and no fun at all any more.

How are the cake and the christening planning going DW?

Help! I've just tried the hand-me-down knight's outfit on DS and it's too big and he hates it. It's probably not so much too big that I wouldn't send him in it anyway but the hating bit is going to ruin it.

We've got a sword and shield and I think he might wear the cape, what else can I put him in to make him look knight-ish?

Panic over. I have reminded myself that it is a child's party and not an historical re-enactment and one of the other children is going as batman

He has a sword and a shield, a cape and I might be able to persuade him to wear the "chainmail" head thingy and maybe even a simple crown thing. Will put him in jeans and a t-shirt under it all. Done

Just for me, I'm considering printing out our family coat of arms and putting in on the t-shirt with some of the left over transfer paper from his party though

sorry, Blathers - I was out all weekend - hence lack of response! Seems like it is more than sorted now, though.

Hi all
After being inspired by this thread we're having a knight and princess party for ds1 6th birthday in a couple of weeks. I've ordered shields to colour in from Baker Ross but I'm just wondering how to decorate them. They're quite large and would take a fair bit of colouring with felt tip pens. Want to avoid the potential mess of painting too. Any tips?
Thanks

Hello runnervt.

In a word - stickers. You can get big tubs of foam stickers from Hobbycraft, or letter ones from various places (which were very popular when we did it - interestingly some 4yos want to put their names on, others just a random selection of letters )

Felt tips also useful for those wanting to bespoke their shields.

I also had some paper cutouts from this ebay store (mostly dragons and horses) which needed glue sticks, but were bigger than the stickers so they covered more of the shield.

letter stickers

Thanks for those suggestions stealth - they look good.

Hello all. Pmsl at your historical re-enactment drama blathers. Christening booked and i got the chapel at cheaper rate after i kicked up a fuss. Ive cut out 50 bunting flags, just literally with pinking shears and just gonna sew to some tape as only want them for splash of colour. Mil was ready to make me double sided personalised lot but it would be a waste!

Cant decide whether to do fruit/sponge stacked cake or stacked pink sponge cakes graduating in colour. You know like rainbow cake but pink inside. Well?

Shades of pink sounds fantastic - if you think there are people who would expect fruit cake you could always make a plain one??

sewing basket cake photos here, BTW.

Glad to amuse :) I did do the coat of arms t-shirt in the end. All colour co-ordinated to match with the cloak. I even found the real family coat of arms for our surname!

I'm going to get this kid beaten up if I don't stop by upper school aren't I!

I vote for stacked pink sponge cakes too. It sounds amazing - much like Stealth's cake.

I've just been checking how up to date my Amazon wishlist is as it's not long till my birthday now and family have been asking. You can tell I've spent too long on here as it's all cake books and tins!!

runnervt get Stealth to tell you about party bags. I want to do a Knight's party myself just for those bags She did some fantastic games as well if you needed ideas? How is the planning going?

I absolutely love the sewing cake stealth. Is that dd 'helping'?

brittanyjeanallen.wordpress.com/2012/03/27/cocktails-and-cravings-baby-shower/

Cake like this but sugarpaste not royal or buttercream. Wanna do white sugarpaste, white bootees on top and pink pearls round the base. Easy peasy. If i sandwich the layers with buttercream would you flavour it?

I would stick with vanilla for the buttercream.

I want to do a shaded cake now [sulk at lack of excuses to do it]

oh and yes, that is DD "helping". DS's contribution was to eat all the cake trimmings and pronounce that (and I quote) "the chocolate buttercream does tend to overwhelm the cake a little" but he had the camera so I don't have photos of him scoffing or being pompous

The Knight party bags I did would be hard to do now as I cannot find cuddly dragons at anything like the same price again (I have been looking, as DD is agitating for a dragon party this year, and you would think that being the year of the Dragon and all that...)

this is the closest I can find - I made velvet bags (out of cheap furnishing velvet which I had acquired at some stage) and gave each dragon a pile of chocolate coins (nowhere near a whole pack) each to "guard".

No pics of them stealth?

No pictures of the complete bags, that I can find - but http://yfrog.com/nz5cgqaj these are some of the dragons (pictured at the New Year party this year - these are (some of) the ones who stayed with us rather than being re-homed).

try again:

No pictures of the complete bags, that I can find - but these are some of the dragons (pictured at the New Year party this year - these are (some of) the ones who stayed with us rather than being re-homed).

I've got to ask, is your house full of random clutter cos you always seem to have just what you need!!

yes our house is regrettably full of random clutter, but I didn't actually have 24 dragons going spare - I ordered them from the US (orientaltrading.com) for the party - they have just never had them since.

Hi, I was directed over here from my pirate party thread. This is a very long thread, so I hope I'm not butting in!

I'd posted to ask for ideas for a pirate party. We're hiring a hall and throwing DS a pirate party and rather than spend £££££ on some entertainment, we've decided to do it ourselves. Entertaining a bunch of 4 year olds - how hard can it be .

After posting, I did a search on the archives and found some good ideas, but more are always welcome. Also, if anyone has any ideas on how to set up a treasure hunt in a big empty hall, I'd be really grateful!!!

Hello, TheScottishPlayer - welcome. The thread has rambled off somewhat, but only for lack of new parties to plan .

In a big empty hall I would be tempted not to try a treasure hunt as such. Instead, I would make a big treasure map and get them to get clues (as the "prize" at the end of each game, maybe?) to lead them to the treasure at the end. In fact, with 4yos, you could cut the treasure map up into squares and they get one of those at the end of each game, with X marking the spot on the last one? It needs more thought, but could definitely be done. Maybe the map could lead to a pinata as the finale of the party?

As for entertainment - well, they could make pirate hats? - and then you "just" need to theme other games - so "Captain says" instead of simon says, Musical Islands (print out islands on card and blue tack them to the floor to avoid sliding injuries), etc. If it is a really big hall and you can face the clearing up they could dig for party bags treasure in a sandpit (filled with shredded paper or wood shavings for less disasterous mess - most halls won't allow sand cos of damage to the floors) - but IME you would need one with a lid and lots of gaffer tape to keep the "more lively" guests out of it until the right moment.