Mickey Mouse Party | Part 1.

For John's 1st Birthday Party, I went down the route of doing an In The Night Garden party to celebrate. But in this past year, John's new favourite has become Mickey Mouse! Honestly, the boy is obsessed with the Disney icon. So it only seemed sensible to go for a Mickey themed party for his 2nd birthday.

Like all mothers planning a kids birthday party, my first stop for inspiration was Pinterest. And as always I wasn't let down. I started with the invitations, opting for a nice simple Mickey silhouette with one of my favourite photos of John, along with a quip of the saying "Oh Toodles!" from Mickey Mouse Clubhouse (& not a misspelling of "oh twaddles" like Iain first thought!).

Next up was the decorations for the house. I knew I wanted balloons but the cost of helium balloons nearly blew me away. £6+ for a string of 3 balloons!? So instead I opted for buying some red, yellow & black balloons from eBay (£1.59 for 15 here) and used some of my leftover red Christmas ribbon to tie them into bunches of 3 and hung them from the ceiling, nicely finished off with a little Mickey silhouette cut from black card stuck to the ribbon.

Then there was the hanging decorations. I got the idea for the paper chains from Pinterest but thought I could do a better job than the ones I'd seen. Using some cheap card from Hobbycraft, I spent hours cutting, sticking & taping make a whole load of Mickey inspired chains to hang from the ceiling above the table. These are probably my favourite decoration & I'm so pleased with how the turned out. In fact, they're still hanging now as I haven't got the heart to take them down just yet.

Something I'd planned to make since finding a tutorial a few months back was the Paper Ball Chain. Such a simple concept but looks fab hanging amongst the other decorations, particularly when made with Mickey Mouse colours (that being said, I can see myself making these every year now, regardless of party themes). Unfortunately I don't have a big hole punch and wasn't willing to pay £10+ for one, so I instead drew & cut every circle, which lets face it, was pretty tedious! Thankfully once I had all the circles I needed, it was straight forward enough to put together, with a little help from my trusty sewing machine.

Finally there was the "Happy 2nd Birthday" banner I threw together, similar to the Iggle Piggle inspired "Happy 1st Birthday" one I did last year. It involved a little playing around with my computer to get the right sized letters, in the alternating colours, in reverse, to print onto the right (or wrong?) side of the card before adding a few Mickey ears and cutting our & sticking to some string... Simple in theory but a bit of thought has to be put in, so not one to attempt after a sleepless night!

And how could I write about John's 2nd birthday party without mentioning the cake? The boy's Granny (my Mum) - a professional baker & cake decorator of 30+ years - did another fantastic job in creating a perfect cake for the occasion. Featuring the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse around the bottom tier and a big 2 right on the top. Then there was the surprise inside! I pestered her for a rainbow cake for John's 1st Birthday and boy did she deliver! I was disappointed when she said she wouldn't be doing one again for John's 2nd birthday but was pleasantly surprised when it came to cutting the cake. Oh and she also made the Mickey Mouse cupcakes too! The boys are very lucky to have such a clever Granny.

Stay tuned for more photos from John's party later this week...

Home Made Christmas: Preparations - Part One.

It's the most wonderful time of the year! When you're not having to deal with an almost two year old, a newborn baby and the financial burden of only being on maternity pay, that is... This combination of factors prompted me to make the decision to do a home-made Christmas - something I'd talked about doing for years but for one reason or another never really committed to.

So here's my start. I plan to put together some small hampers full of delicious goodies for our family and try my hand at something a little different (candle making perhaps?) for some of the other special people in our lives. But what needed to come first was the chutney's and marmalade to give them plenty of time to mature.

My first Home Made Christmas goodie is Mary Berry's Christmas Chutney. I knew I had to have chutney of some form or another and the combination of ingredients in this recipe seemed to fit the bill perfectly. My Dad even donated his leftover tomatoes from his greenhouse, making the chutney even cheaper & even more delicious. And aside from some timely preparation (peeling, chopping...), the recipe was easy to follow, even for the most novice of cooks.

I opted to make this chutney first as the recipe recommends leaving it to mature for at least a month. Not to mention the fact I'll probably not have time to spend throwing chutneys now I'm dealing with a toddler and a newborn! For now though they're stored in our cupboard, doing their magic, ready to be added to our home-made hampers come Christmas. 

I felt like a little bit of a cheat with my marmalade, opting to use a Home Cook Marmalade tin; but the reality is that it's simply a tin of pre-prepared oranges (so not chopping, pipping or boiling) and all the rest of the cooking is done at home. I threw these together during John's nap time and was thankful for just how easy it was to achieve five good sized jars of marmalade - perfect for the family & our extremely tolerant neighbours.

Home Cook also do tins for Strawberry Jam which are perfect if you're not a fan of marmalade & great for this time of year when all the best jam fruits are going out of season.

Amy's Top Home-made Christmas Tips.

Think ahead. Plan your recipes & do what you can in advance of the big day. Most preserves need time to mature so its worth doing what you can now, cutting down on stress closer to Christmas but also getting the best from your creations.

Use recycled jars. We've been saving all our empty jam & sauce jars for a couple of months now and I also asked my parents to do the same. You could easily spend a small fortune on brand new jars but there's really no need, plus recycling is better for the environment too! Just be sure to sterilise your jars before filling.

Personalise your jars. It's easy enough to spray paint the lids of your jars, which is particularly nice when using recycled ones. Or how about using some jam jar covers? I'm also putting together some personalised labels for our jars but you can also buy different decorative labels or even opt for handmade ones.

Stay tuned for more of our Home Made Christmas as we slowly edge closer to the big day. Including Christmas decorations, cards and sweet treats...

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Sausage The Rabbit

Feeling inspired by all the handmade rabbits at Easter, I decided to make John a bunny of his own. I loved idea of using a newborn sleepsuit as material and I figured it was the perfect way to keep hold of my favourite ones without being overly sentimental, especially since Iain wants to sell all John's newborn clothes.

I decided to use two of John's first sleepsuits; the ones his Granny bought him whilst we were in the hospital since all the clothes we bought him were 0-3 months and far to big for his little 6lbs 12oz bum. Due to the material being a light jersey I applied some iron-on interfacing to the back and I used this pattern to create it. It took me a few hours and although the stitching is a little here & there (due to using the wrong foot on my sewing machine), I'm overall very happy with the result.

And the name? I call John my 'Little Sausage' but I know I'll not be able to get away with that forever so it seemed fitting to have something that will always be little and won't grow to be embarrassed at being called 'Sausage'.