my sun, my stars

Balloons, giant number four balloon, a pig cake, a tractor ride. Nothing was spared for the birthday party down at the farm on Saturday. We were blessed with a fantastic sunny weather for the whole weekend, which really made our celebrations all the more special.
It was the first time we organised a "party" for our daughter, so we decided to book it with one of the local farms we visited before. For a four year-old active animal lover, it was just the right choice.
I thought the highlight would be the private animal handling session, but it turned out the tractor ride  won it.
We had planned to bake a cake for the evening after the party, but the gorgeous pig cake we ordered for the party was so big we had loads left, so the homebaking will have to wait till next weekend when we have more guests coming to celebrate this special occasion.

We were lucky and grateful that the party turned out so well. Here are a few tips I picked up along the process:

* book your event WELL in advance - I mean at least 6 weeks. The farm party I booked was actually way more popular than I thought, and on the day I wanted there was only one opening left! 

*party bags - this was a gandma job, saving me time and hassle to look for all the bits and bobs. She got the plain bags (Hobbycraft I think), stickers and sweets. I am not one for too many plastic useless toys in party bags, so I was in charge of finding something not-too-useless. In the end I settle for a set of Frozen hairpins for the girls and one of those funny compressed face towels for boys, both from Wilko

*our gorgeous Pig Cake is from Marks and Spencer, they take an online order and then you just collect a day or so before the party, it was perfect

* the few decorations I got are from our local Tesco supermarket (the big 4 is not). I had literally zero time to do anything, so those paper balls were a blessing, and they are super easy to put up

* Finally, the ultimate alpha mum trick - I used my original guest list to write down who each present was from so that we can thank everyone individually. Simple but useful ;)

3 things to smile about #6

I am not one to linger too long here about my personal life, but let's just say that February was like the worst.month.ever. But hey, everything being relative, I have decided to focus on the positive, smile again, and try not to be too much of a miserable cow. 'Cos goodness knows only bad things happen to miserable cows. I'm all about the karma, baby!
So here are some of the things I have been smiling about these last few days.

A rustic bunch of flowers waiting for us on the table we booked at Cedar Farm in Lancashire. Early March seemed like the right time to put February behind us (you don't say, hey!) so we headed North and reconnected with our roots a bit. I just loved that bouquet and the contrast it made with the bluey-grey wall behind: simple, effective. I would have never put red tulips with cherry blossoms, but wow, don't you think?

Putting old bits of fabric together. Always good therapy, and what better to do put together a mother-daughter collaboration? Half-way through the preparations I realised I wouldn't have enough of the red spotted fabric and had to change, but it was still a nice little DIY thing to do.

don't mind me while I take a quick photo with bed hair, no proper background, and let's not even go down the lighting route :(

Last but not least, this absolute beauty from Zara. A cheap-as-chips, sure to cheer you up kinda bag, aka the perfect little picnic basket bag. It will be perfect for spring, summer, and may even end up with mushrooms in it come Autumn! I simply loved it as soon as I saw it on a parisian website a few weeks ago. Unfortunately I didn't order it straight away, and it got sold out online pretty quickly. Luckily for me, the Oxford Street branch had ONE left. Yay me!

DIY advent calendar

Way before each and every single brand started having their own advent calendar, I started making those DIY advent calendars for friends and family. After a couple of years they had generated enough interest from colleagues that I started batch-adventing on a much bigger scale.
I have left this post a bit late in November, but do not despair, readers, it's not too late to put your own DIY advent calendar together for your loved ones!
Head out to the nearest high street near you this weekend, and keep your eyes open to spot all the lovely bargains, like the adorable mini Lindt chocolate bears pictured above ( I got 3 for £1). My best shops for gathering advent calendar supplies are supermarkets for chocolates and fancy cooking ingredients (for example this year one of my calendars has fancy little cake decorations), Boots and Superdrug for their mini-sized toiletries, and places like Tiger, which offer the wacky alternative options.

For me the best surprise is that you never really know what you're going to get, so I purposefully wrap a real mix of things like those mini toiletries or single-use face masks.
If you know the person you are wrapping for, even better, you can tailor their calendar and make their day virtually everyday :)

This year for example, I haven't really pushed the boat out, but I've been a bit cheeky and am trying to encourage someone hooked on pizza to try their hand at a bit of cooking. I hope they'll take the challenge and have a go at some of those easy-cook recipes. Another day they might try their luck at the lottery and buy their weight in pizza!

The worse part of the whole process is the wrapping. Man, do I hate it! Back in the day I used a single paper, but thought it ended up a bit dull, so the year after I used a different wrapping for nearly every day - what a crazy person I was! Last year I went for brown paper with simple red-and-white  twine, and guess what, what goes around comes around, and this year I am back on the simplest possible wrapping paper for every surprise.
After all, it's the thought that counts, and believe you me, whoever gets one of your DIY advent calendars will love you for putting all this together for them. So, with just about a week to go, don't hesitate, hit the high street or your local supermarket, wrap everything up, put in a decorated box or small basket, and hey presto, make someone happy for a whole 24 days in a row!

3 things to smile about #5

This time of year nothing makes me smile more than preparing for Christmas - well, it's only just around the corner isn't it? And before that, there's the advent calendars to think about, of course.
I've gone a bit mental with my advent calendar boxes business in the past three or four years, and although I am sure I'll come back to it, this year sadly, I'm not making any apart than for close family. The truth is, I've left it all a bit too late to get organised on that scale, and in any case it's good to leave things to rest sometimes. So one of the best things at the moment is browsing for my own advent calendar, and there is so much choice out there, it'll be hard to pick one.
 Carrying on with traditions, this year I will definitely be doing is homemade stocking fillers. So here are some of the easiest, lovely things that make me smile.

First up is the old classic - lavender bags. The is a really easy one to make, and a crowd pleaser, because you can always use a lavender bag to bung in a drawer or in the car for that extra fresh smell of Provence! I order my lavender online from the good people of Amazon, and any old bits of scraps will do for your fabric. That said, this series of fabric above is perfect as you can just cut up around one of the adverts.

Next up is great for little people, and although it's a bit fiddly it's a rewarding one. I make my life easier with this one by not turning any of the fabric over, I just shear it after sewing. You do need to get some small magnets, but again, my Amazonian friends are very resourceful on this one.

Finally, handwarmers. Who doesn't curse the cold when they go out on a cold morning? Those are so easy to make, and they're a cool, natural alternative to the ones sold in the shops for a fiver. You'll probably use them longer too. My one and only trick is to double-sew the edges if you're using rice like me. It just ensures your grains stay where they should, and don't end up in the bottom of your coat pockets!

Well, I hope I have inspired you to make a few stocking fillers with fabric scraps. I would love to hear more ideas from you. Do you make your own stocking fillers? Do you make and sell at Chrismas markets?

Easter Baby

This year's early Easter coincided with Baby's third birthday, which gave us the opportunity to see family and to organise a small first party in our new house (more on the new house later, we're still feeling our way around it, but gosh, is it nice to have your own place at last!)
Baby J could not have been happier with her birthday. I saw lots of hanging balloons on Pinterest lately and tried it the night before the big day - man, the look on her face when she saw them in the morning was priceless, I have never seen that look of amazement on her before, like "really, all this for me?" Then presents, then grandparents arriving without her knowing, then a whole day at London zoo, and then my delicious but not very "together" pecan cake (Delia's recipe here), wow, what a day for our big girl. And what proud, happy parents she makes us.

DIY tips
 ♥ For the balloons, I used some simple masking tape and raffia ribbons, we're lucky to have the right kind of skylight to hand them on to, but Pinterest has loads of ideas for balloons hanging off doorframes etc too.
 ♥ The cake really was nice, honest, especially the caramelised pecans and mascarpone cream BUT do not let a three-year-old dictate the decoration of said cake, stick to Delia's, or wait until the very last minute to add your hundreds and thousands!

cute DIY salt and pepper

 

 

 

The minute I saw this super cute idea on Pinterest, I knew I had to do it! This easy-to-make salt and pepper set is just adorable. The hardest thing was finding the jars (Morrison's and Amazon) and trying to keep them off Baby's hands, which we succeeded to a certain degree. Only once she got hold of them, she started banging them together and we had our biggest fright yet when we thought she'd hurt herself. But hey ho, in the esnd after spending a lovely afternoon in A & E, all was fine and dandy, not even a scratch to be seen. And now I've got the cutest salt and pepper set around the block.

Dès que j'ai vu cette super idée sur Pinterest, j'ai su que je le voulais! Ce duo de salière et poivrière est tout simplement adorable. Le plus dur a été de trouver les petits pots (Morrison's et Amazon) et de les tenir éloignés de Bébé, ce qu'on a réussi a faire a peu près. Enfin une fois qu'elle s'en est emparée, elle a commence a les entrechoquer et nous a fait notre plus belle peur quand on a cru qu'elle s' était sérieusement blessée. Mais bon, après avoir attend toute une après-midi aux urgencies, tout allait bien, pas meme une écorchure! Et maintenant j'ai les plus jolis petits accessoires de table du voisinage.