Shirley's Party Advice Part 7 - how did they all get so big...

[stealthsquiggle]

Part 7 - link to previous one to follow!

Me too i had a cheese-cake and got not one morsel of it!! Dh says he didnt even see it!!

Had a bit of good luck today.

We had invited 9 children in all to DD's party, 7 girls and 2 boys. When we gave out the invites, 1 child's mother was fairly sure she wouldn't be able to come so when I did the Yellow Moon order and stuck on a pack of 6 plastic rings to go in the pirate treasure party bags I though all would be OK - 1 each for the girls (minus the probably-not-coming child) and the boys are getting something else. Then probably-not-coming's Mum told me she's sorted everything out and the little girl would be there after all! Back-up plan was going to be to sub littlest niece with something else.

The rings arrived this morning and as I quickly looked at the pack, I noticed that one of the rings was missing it's gem so I rang YM. They're sending me a whole new pack and I can keep the old one too! So now I'll have 11 party rings for 9 children and the boys might get one too :)

I am officially recovering and looking forward to having gone from no babysitter for tomorrow (and extreme stress) to 2 options.

I can't avoid the sewing machine bits of birthday party prep anymore!

Starting with a nice 'easy' sail....

Make sure you have a nice new needle.

(in better news which no one cares about I have updated SwiftKey and it's working fine again )

Rectangular (easier) sail is done.

Now for trapezoid sail! [scared]

Finished!

Bed time.

Party bags tomorrow?

Hello

I've been advised to repost this on this thread..

I want to throw a 'Once Upon A Time' party for my daughters first birthday. I've done huge parties for DD1 (Alice In Wonderland, Ben & Holly & Princess Pink) with marquees, endless decorations, entertainers etc.

Once Upon A Time / Storybook is currently the best idea really for my DD2 to compete with her older sisters parties and I want to make it amazing.

I'm thinking book page bunting, Snow White 'poison' toffee apples... Lots of netting / voile under tables and around gazebos and marquees to make it more fairytale.. And then I'm struggling!! Any ideas?

Georgie can my DD be friends with yours, please? Your parties sound fab.

Storybook - so, decor sounds good. There is a fantastic "once upon a time" cake in one of my books which would be perfect. You need all the elements of a fairy tale somehow - heroes, princesses, dragons, witches. Where I am currently stuck is on what they could do. How old is DD2?

I found the cake - it's in a Lindy Smith book called "storybook cakes"

http://www.lindyscakes.co.uk/shop/images/D/SB-Storybook-02.jpg this one

try again

clicky linky

Lol sorry stealth.

georgie can you give us more info is this in a marquee like the others? When is it? How many kids etc? Because im sure we can go mad with a summer/spring in a marquee better than january in the village hall..

I love that cake!

It's in June, I know it's a long way off but for my daughters third birthday this year finding about 100 teapots, spray painting them and adding spots and making them into towers, painting cups and saucers, making giant flowers, making / finding costumes, stringing about 1000 playing cards onto wire etc took months so I'm trying to get a head start!

I'll get a marquee again and have it in my garden, probably a Capri one (or 2) because I like how open they are to incorporate the rest of the garden and decorations.

It's a first birthday but will probably be about 50 adults and 30 children of all ages as we invite everyone in our family and all our friends.

I'm I'm Surrey and also looking for theme appropriate or at least colour appropriate bouncy castle & soft play to hire too...

And a theme appropriate entertainer.

For Alice in Wonderland I had a mad hatter magician who was fab, but an Alice who did party games and balloon animals and the kids didn't like her at all!

What age range of children? Would a storyteller work, do you think?

Can you do my party please curious?!

Blather and TheDoctors - yes I want that cheese thing!

Is it worth making pompom things or should I find them cheap on eBay?

beans - it's worth a look at eBay prices vs cost of materials, but if you have time I would find a bulk supplier of tissue paper and make the pompoms, leaving more budget for hanging lanterns

Lanterns that take candles...?

LED tealights

The youngest child will be about 4 months by then, a few 1 year olds, lots of 3 year old and then cousins and friends children from 3 to 13.

Not helpful I know!

Sorry, I'm on countdown for my own party so am in full on pirate mode but will be back with some ideas once it's over :)

Right, today I've done the -pin-the-flag-on-the-map map and sewn DD's pixie dust pouch. My theory was that the party bags will just be slightly bigger versions so it was good practice. I know where I went wrong so the bags should be easier now...

But they'll have to wait until tomorrow, I'm running tonight, in the dark, in Bedford! On a calf I tore just last week that is still a bit sore! Wish me luck

Good luck blathers.

Beansbeans - i've made the pompoms before and they are so quick to make, if you google it shows you how to cut the ends to resemble different flowers like peonies/chyrsanthumums etc. i'd say if you can get the materials and make your own you'll prob get much more for your money.

Georgie - as yours is a bookish/fairytale theme you may like a lot of the stuff we recommended for beans further up this thread, stealth did her a pinterest board with lots of script/book pages stuff that would work really well as decoration in your marquee.

Right so once upon a time, with book page themed decorations etc i'd aim for a mismatch of key fairy tale details a yellow brick road? Gingerbread/sweetie houses(buy them up now as their everywhere or lakeland do a mould so you can make some over and over again) gingerbread man, the three bears chairs or porridge bowls? A bed piled high with mattresses and a pea..cinderellas coach or glass slipper..red hiding hoods. Food in riding hoods gingham clothed basket..

Entertainment: a storyteller or a puppet show of various fairy tales?

I have done loads this week!!

DD's outfit is done. I have finally sewn her a little 'pixie dust' pouch so she's good to go.
The mast and sails for the food table are finished and hidden in the garage so that DD will be surprised on Sunday.
The spyglasses are painted and ready to go. I've painted the cardboard cones I got from the scrapstore brown and added some woodgrain and gold bands round the top and bottom. DS told me they were really good which made me smile. The gems and stickers have arrived to decorate them too.
I've drawn out a big 4 shaped pirate map to pin the flag on to,
The pirate flag for outside the front door is finished,
and I've just finished the party bags!

Left to do are:
The flags for the map - I thought I'd make little coloured flags on cocktail sticks and then stick them in a lump of blu tack ready to be stuck on the map.
The flags for the hot dogs and shark infested jelly boats
The signs for the food
and to make the food but I can't do any of the just yet. I do need to work out how exactly I'm going to make this cake though! Any ideas?

Also, DH is unconvinced by the pass-the-treasure-chest idea. He says how will they know when it's finished? I guess I can either let them pass it round with no more treats in than there are children so the last sweet goes to the last child or I use my little chest filled with gold dubloons as a party prop and do a 'normal' wrapped pass-the-parcel? I'm going to wrap up 1 present anyway for the person who wins the Pin-the-flag game so I could wrap another....