The little man turned 1 last week, can you believe it! What a year it has been, we have had the good, bad and the ugly but you know what, we have come out the other side fighting and I am so proud of how far my little munchkin has come considering the rough start to his little life.
I wanted to have a nice intimate party for him with family and friends and couldn’t think of anywhere better than having it at Mum & Dads as they have a big back garden and plenty of space in their house. Since it was nearly May and the beginning of better weather I decided to have a barbecue and with that in order I set out with my party planning.
First up was the entertainment, I wanted to be able to have something that would amuse the older kids and also something that was going to be able to entertain the little ones who would all be 1 years of age and under. I hired two bouncy castles to keep the older kids amused one of which was a slide and then got a childrens gazebo, which is an amazing piece of kit and which I highly recommend for the summer. I got mine from B&M Bargains for £14.99. It has netting the whole way around and zip closes so you can have your baby inside and not have to worry about any wasps, bees etc harming them. I then got the foam recreation mats from ELC at Mothercare to put on the grass and inside the gazebo so the babies would all have a soft play area to move about in. There I put a ball pit, a little tent and tunnel and some bigger balls for them.
Knowing that our sporadic weather in Ireland can change in a heartbeat I also got a larger gazebo to put up so that would shield everyone if there where any bursts of rain and also protecting the food being cooked on the barbecue. I didn’t get anything fancy just a little gazebo again from B&M for £16.99 which served its purpose and was very quick to put up and take down.
For decorations I chose some gorgeous blue pompoms from Party Pieces along with birthday banners, balloon centrepiece (which did not require helium you just blow it up) party boxes, napkins, cups, plates and some brilliant little party bag fillers including cute little animal bif bats. For the rest of the party bag contents I got party bubbles, sweets, plane gliders, fairy ones for the girls and dino ones for the boys. For the babies party bags I got board books, bags of little puffs by Kiddylicious, Ellas Kitchen apple & ginger biscuits and little tambourines and smiley hand drums.
For the cake I wanted to do something myself, yes I know that was maybe a bit of a huge undertaking but I was determined to give it a whirl. I looked for some inspiration on Pinterest and settled on a four tiered cake that I loved and give it a little twist of my own by adding some ribbon and wooden letters painted blue which I got from a Play Resource Shop. Just out of curiosity I priced around a few places and was quoted from £95-£250 for the cake to be made which was a ridiculous amount to pay for a baby’s first birthday cake.
With not that much time on my hands and never having baked a cake before, I knew that four tiers would be too much to take on myself, so my cousin had a brainwave that I could use some polystyrene tiers and cover them in fondant. It took a couple of goes before I was happy with my first tier as I used too much water when putting the icing over the polystyrene and the fondant was wrinkling too much. If you are attempting this yourself, definitely invest in a cake smoother, I got two of them after my first disaster and it was so much easier for the remaining tiers to be able to use one on top and on the sides. I used YouTube for reference on how to ice a cake. For cupcakes I had a simple bun mixture and made my own buttercream with blue food colouring added and lots of different sprinkles and toppings, which Ella had much delight in assisting with the decorating the night before the party. Overall I was thrilled with how it turned out considering it was my first attempt.
For inflating the balloons on the day of the party I got a helium canister from Argos. Having priced on Amazon, ebay and a few local party suppliers Argos was the best priced at £19.99 and it was so easy to use. There where a few bad reviews about peoples balloons being on the floor the next morning, but as long as you don’t inflate any latex balloons the night before you will have no issues. It does even clearly state this on the instructions as well. Latex balloons will only stay inflated for approx. 6 hrs.
For the rest of the food, I did a salad, cut up watermelon and used lolly sticks from a craft shop, pizza and a huge hit with the kids and adults was a sweet shop stall which really did look so good on the table surrounded by sweets and popcorn.
Despite the odd little shower we where blessed with good weather and apart from some burnt burgers it was a great day and one we will cherish forever. A huge thank you to all our amazing family and friends who celebrated the day with us and for all their generosity. We are very blessed to have you in our lives and Cameron was one very spoilt little boy.
Completely conked out after all the excitement, we took him home hoping for maybe his first night of sleeping through, did it happen? Who are you kidding 🙂
