It's in the rules....

Did you know birthdays have rules?  welll they do according to my children - what they mean is there are certain things that must happen on a birthday - obviously presents and cards - opened altogether on the morning of the birthday, birthday tea  on the day of their birthday - including Mum and Dads birthday, candles and cake on the day of their birthday and at some point a party planned months in advance!
(They still are not sure about the grown ups not having parties idea!!)

Birthdays are a big thing in our house - and I guess that is my fault - which is absolutely fine, you see for me birthdays are a celebration of life, a celebration of another year of knowing my precious children.






I think I probably always did birthdays but when Rebecca's birth went so drastically wrong and we came so close to losing her - it changed things, it changed us.





So when we came to her first birthday we had reason to celebrate - she was alive and well, she was growing and holding her own - somehow it became even more important to mark these milstones so we celebrate and thank God each year for each of our naughty, noisy and incredibly amazing girls.

I digress - so back to those rules! Rebecca's birthday this year fell at a particularly hectic time - and it was the day before her party - her party was sorted and I just had her moshi cake to finish - when she walks in and asks if her cake would be ready for tea ahhhhh how could have I thought I would get away with no cake for her birthday tea!!! I explained that it wouldn't - she just smiled a knowing smile and went out with Daddy - you see in her head she believed I could not possibly fail to produce a cake - it's in the rules!!

So I took the off cuts from her moshi cake - arranged them to form a butterfly,
armed Sophie and Annie with icing and let them get on with it - while I worked on moshi  - I helped them with the finishing touches but it was pretty much their own work and they were as proud as punch of it and Rebecca loved it - you see the rules simply say a cake - it didn't need to be huge or flash or perfect just made with love on her birthday.

I have made hundreds of cakes and you know I think this one might just be my favourite! 

I'd love to hear from you  - maybe your family have bithday rules or traditions you might like to share?

Monster Mayhem

This year Rebecca chose a Moshi Party for her birthday - for those not in the know Moshi's are computer  characters - you choose a character and design their room - they vary from cute and cuddly to truely bizarre you then chose your activities from challenges to puzzles to games.

Rebecca's monster is Katsuma, fortunatly this is one of the main characters so lots of stuff out there.

 The monsters all have the same eye and one of Rebecca's favourite puzzles involves counting eyes so the eyes feature in several ways - cut out eyes decorated the hall and the sides of her cake - her cup cakes featured the eyes though with hindsight the children actually preferred buttercream to the fondant icing.

In addition to the eyes the hall was decorated with moshi characters purchased from party pieces  - what I hadn't realised is that these came on two sheets of plastic and all needed to be cut out!!

I used craft artist to create the letters of her name from a computer wallpaper image of Katsuma which worked well amongst the eyes.

 I had very clear intructions when it came to her cake - this year I even got a diagram!! it was to be round and flat - with her Moshi on top - this also had to be flat!!! She did design it with daisies round the edge but after some negotiation we agreed on some of the moshi plants that grow in her garden!!!

 The sides were made by adding a purple sugarpaste band  then using varied sizes of circle cutter to create the eyes.

 Katsuma was created by printing a pictture from the internet and using this as a pattern to form the character.

 One of the games the girls enjoy is the 'Ice Sceam shop' so this was included in the plans  - we served ice-cream for pudding and Rebecca helped serve the toppings - we even managed green sauce with the cunning addition of green food colour to some squeezy syrup.

The children were all placed into Moshi  teams when they arrived and had the chance to decorate their own moshi masks , we then had several rounds of timed activities - these were varied to allow children of different ages and abilities to participate: they included crosswords, wordsearch, treasure hunt, mazes amongst others but the favourite by far was the create a mummy round!

The time went so quickly and the children were dispatched full of sugar!! with a moshi activity book - a great deal from the Book People and the sweets and przes they had won during the rounds of puzzle palace.

Beautiful buttons!

I have to thank my sister-in-law Rachel from Dreaming of the Country http://vicarswifeintraining.blogspot.co.uk/  for the inspiration for this present for my neice's 11th birthday present.

I have always written Ambers name with a large lower case 'a' rather than a capital 'A' so I wanted to use this for her cushion - 5 weeks of sewing on buttons later a skinny capital 'A' may have been a better plan!!!!

Hindsight is a great thing!

The buttons were a mix called 'wake me up before you go go' from Felted Fancies Supplies, a facebook shop that supplies beautiful ribbons, buttons and felt.
 https://www.facebook.com/FeltedFanciesSupplies

If you are inspired Rachel has step by instructions on her blog
http://vicarswifeintraining.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/diy-gifts-personalised-button-cushion.html

Now just to wrap it and send it to her - Just hoping she likes it!!!!

All quiet on the blogging front!!

Hi , it has been a while since my last post. I am currently upto my eyes with projects on the go all over the place -  I am in the middle of a Gruffalo story sack for playgroup, an initial cushion for my neice's birthday in April - thanks to Rachel  http://vicarswifeintraining.blogspot.co.uk/ for the idea - just a little late with that one!, organising a activity afternoon for the end of term, planning Rebecca's birthday party - all things Moshi and sorting out holiday bible club for July! the good news is that I will have lots to blog about soon, the bad news is they all have to be done by the summer - or before!!!
I have to confess I have  bought cards for the June birthdays - and paying for them reminded me as to why I started making cards in the first place!
So back to work then!!

Mummy, next year can I have a flat cake?!

 Rebecca had a princess party for her 5th birthday with her own fairy tale castle cake.

It was a two tier sponge with hollow towers made from modelling paste, the roofs were ice cream cones covered with pink sugarpaste tiles.

The board featured a gel moat and sugarpaste grass though with hindsight I wish I had added some flowers in the grass and possibly some trailing flowers round the doors, windows etc but  then there are always things that I wish I had done!

I was really pleased with this cake , Rebecca seemed happy with it and had a great party. Chatting about it the next morning she was really pleased with the party , I asked her if she had liked her cake her reply.....
"It was ok but Mummy next year could I have a flat cake!!!!"

Princess

Till the girls could speak I got to choose their cakes - well I got to choose most things then! On the whole I love the transition from baby to toddler seeing their personalities develop and them begin to have ideas and opinions. However that does mean that sometimes they choose things that I might not!! Annie had a star party for her third birthday - this corresponded with her beginning playgroup in the stars group! but she was clear it was all to be red and white stars and this was great for me  - we made star invites, star decorations and came up with some star based games.

For her cup cakes  I drizzled red chocolate across the top and added a red sugarpaste star.

When it came to her cake - I came up with various star designs none of which met with her approval and although I would have put my foot down I wasn't particularly taken with any of the ideas anyway -  in the end I asked her what do you want then?!

 

                                              A princess cake!! 

I added a few stars though to be fair this was for my benefit really as she was just happy to have a princess!!

So come Annie's fourth birthday she was clear from the start  - it was to be a Cinderella birthday - forgetting the whole star cake discussion I foolishly suggested a pumpkin carriage cake - no Mummy I want a princess cake!!!

Her cupcakes were two tone icing with a blue chocolate shoe and some white sugar sprinkles!

 

I decided to make some items for her party bags and created a felt wand with each child's name on. I cut the hearts out with my big shot and for speed glued the inner heart and letters on with fabric glue, I then sewed the two halves together using blanket stitch stuffed them and sewed in a dowel which I had covered in light blue ribbon. I was pleased with them The older girls had a similar gift but as a hanging decoration  - I left out the stick and added a hanging ribbon.

 

It might be challenging at times living with three strong independent little girls who even now know their own minds but I wouldn't have it any other way, as I write Rebecca is sketching out her cake for June with the emphasis being on it being a flat cake - but that's a whole other story - as for next year Annie wants a Tinkerbell party so I guess that will be another princess then!!!

All Red White and Blue!

Rebecca has loved the Union Jack since the wedding of Prince William and Kate, so it was no real surprise that for her birthday last year she wanted a party based on her flag.

For me this was great as 2012 just happened to be the year of the Royal Jubilee and London hosting the Olympics - the shops were full of items for parties - in fact you couldn't walk into a shop without falling over red, white and blue!

When it came to her cake she wanted her flag, I was just a bit concerned - the lines would need to be very straight and accurate to look good. 

Then I came up with the idea of creating the blocks of colour out of small sugar paste flowers. Cutting enough flowers  was tedious but they worked and the end result was a pretty representation of 

the Union Jack.

I used sugarpaste to write Rebecca's name on the cakes and decorate it with some more of those flowers, with a few larger ones to complete the effect.

The cupcake were simple but effective with blue and white sugar and a red jelly heart.

 

 These quirky cake pops were great for a summer party and fooled the kids - well almost!!

 They were made by mixing cake crumb and butter cream to form a dough which is rolled into balls and chilled. They were then dipped in white chocolate and placed on a sheet of greaseproof. I then added a small pool of chocolate to resemble melting ice-cream then added a cut down cone before the chocolate set and some red white and blue (obviously!!) sprinkles.

 Rebecca had a great time and still loves her flag!!