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

[stealthsquiggle]

Part 7 - link to previous one to follow!

Leave buttercream out. Once it has crusted it will be fine at room temperature, and no it won't disintegrate the sugar paste. If you want a different solution, though, royal icing makes really effective sea.

thanks stealth it does appear to be ok this morning!

Food box done.
Yellow paper islands done.
Craft box done.
Ds2s pirate costume out and ready.
Decoration box done.
Phew.
I am sure I have forgotten something! :)

Well...back from the pirate party!
It all seemed to go well and the kids enjoyed it.
Lots of helpers too so clean up only took 15 mins.
Ds2 is shattered though so early night.
Thanks for all the advice and help...am exhausted!
Ds1 has impetigo on his ear so May not be at school tomorrow.
Great.

A kid at our school had a bad case of impetigo which i question and was told quite stroppily that secretary hsd lost her infectious diseases list but that it was fine. I checked and its 48hrs once you start the antibiotic cream or til its crusted over. This kid was at school the whole time and was in charge of distributing snack too so im waiting to see if we get it too.

Sorty i posted too eatly, dd was having a tantrum on the floor.

Glad the party went ok. Did you get all your activities and games done? Did it all go down well?

Glad it went well, Badvoc. Could you have a duvet day with DS's tomorrow or are you working?

Christening cake was well received and duly demolished by the congregation at a very "high church" service.

Onwards. Party. I only have one "no" so far (mother in question said she wasn't sure who was more gutted that they are away that weekend, her DD or her ). I will start baking and freezing tonight, I think.

Hi DW...he has had it before (in the same place on his ear) and I have put some of Dhs impetigo cream on but I think I will phone tomorrow and say he won't be back til weds...he is off tues anyway due to industrial action by the teachers.
Ds2 has a school trip tomorrow. He will be shattered.
Party seemed to go well...games worked although it was a bit frantic. My sils sister came too who is a nursery nurse and she did some songs and join in games which really helped whilst I got the food out.
All the kids - only 2 of a class of 20 didn't come - behaved really well. 2 of the mothers asked me if I hired myself out for parties!!
(I said no)
:)

Stealth...I don't work so will be at home with him tomorrow which is a bit of a nightmare as I have so much to do....oh well.

I must admit i quite enjoy hosting parties and get really pissed off if the host is a wet lettuce cos i want to say get out the way and let me do it better! Im dreading the pizza party if some spotty oik is gonna be leading it cos i'll be saying you make pizzas and let me get in with this!

Oh and i have received my characture dd1 images from my dad ready for invites. Yippeee

9 out of 10 Spotty oiks would retreat at the first sign that someone was prepared to do it for them, so I think you will be ok .

I am working myself up to attempting the aprons. Trouble is, having read the instructions in the dye kit, I have realised that it's a one shot deal - the dyes only last 45 minutes once you have added the water, so everything needs to be ready to go. Which in turn means that I can't do it until I have answers (or at least most - if there are a couple of non-replies then they will just have to have aprons without names on).

I also now need to wait because I unpacked the aprons to wash them this morning and there is no way on earth that they will fit DS, so I need to find adult sized aprons too (which Baker Ross used to do, as I have had them before, but now don't )

Grr. I need to get stuff like this out of the way before I start cooking...

I got ds1 a plain apron from John Lewis stealth for £6

Right so we have two problems?

To label aprons with the right name and to source aprons cheaply in adult sizes? Do they need to be cotton because the aprons im getting are cheap but polyester.

In terms of the labels can you just label one for every invitee or is there some reserve list? If ive done personalised stuff(did personalised chocolate bars when dd1 was 2) then ive made up a party bag anyway just in case n sent it on saying sorry you couldnt make it? Can you do that? Just make them all up?

Ebay looks the best bet for cheap aprons in all sizes.

Labelling aprons is a problem because of my mad plan - which is to write names with dye resist, and then tie dye the aprons. This also means that I need cotton aprons for adults (if I do them) and DS (who is about 5ft 4" nowadays ) because the dye won't take otherwise. I have the small/medium sized DC ones, from Baker Ross, and I have just found ones aimed at teenagers for £3.10 each, so I think I will go with those.

I can't do named aprons for non-turner-uppers, as I only have enough for my DGodaughter and her little sister if I take into account the one "no" that I have already... If we end up with some non-named ones, that's fine, we can add them to the collection.

Red, orange and yellow cakes in oven

Did you do indigo, or stick with 6 layers?

I did 6. Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue and Purple rather than indigo and violet. Made dividing the cake mix up easier if there were 6.

That's the sensible option, clearly, but the pedant in me wants to do 7 and use the rest of the third batch of cake mix for fairy cakes

I'll see how this lot come out. I might need to redo orange - the colour wasn't looking great.

I ended up with fairy cakes anyway even with 6 cakes. I left them colour free for the parents who were a little jittery about the colours.

I did 6 too and dont be fooled by oramge, my yellow and orange i redid them as they didnt seem right but when i broke into them they had been perfect the outside was browned and threw me off.

My orange gel is very old - orange has lumps of colour in . And red has broken slightly at the edges, so I think I will end up with a third batch anyway. Not tonight, though - need to get 3 cakes in freezer and colours into the dishwasher before DD sees any of it.

My dd knew what was in ours because it was dd2's but now i wish i'd kept it from her. Mind you dh stole my big reveal anyway by his slasher routine. Bastard.

All my invites have duly been sent in the dead of night by my Daddy. Woke at 5am to an invite a pizza box label, another for coming and charactures of all the party guests. Except my pizza boxes and printer are all packed now!! Im yet to pay the deposit so im going to absolutely have to do that now.

Now, is it wrong to book the village hall now for dd2's (i want to do a messy play party) whilst im still a resident and get resident half price rates. Then move on friday.

True to form i googled cake ideas for dd2 (not even done on dd1 yet) and i want to make a cake slice cake that looks like playdoh like this here

Except then i found this and its way better but i cant do it like this now can i!! look