12 Days of Christmas Christmas Table

October 09, 2021 in christmas, 12 Days of Christmas

The 12 days of Christmas table decorating ideas, pottery barn 12 days of Christmas decorations

Halloween Cemetery

October 04, 2021 in Halloween, halloween, Halloween Cemetery

Halloween Cemetery with a wicker man

Halloween Carnival

October 04, 2020 in Halloween, halloween, Dessert Table, free printable, Halloween Carnival

We’ve been wanting to host a Halloween Carnival party for a number of years and when we finally did it was a lot of fun, the party was based on a vintage time when Freak Shows visited our cities and towns with their very strange and unique acts.

The party included a Dessert Table with Free printables.

We hope you enjoy, Julie.

I used a lot of plastic carnival striped sceen setter on the walls and red and gold streamers from the ceiling to create an enclosed circus tent atmosphere.

We made the ticket booth from cardboard and attached round white string llghts around the window. One of my favourite zombies was armed with a fist full of tickets to greet our guests.

I created our halloween carnival by repurposing our normal halloween friends. Witches were transformed to Evil Clowns, and zombies and ghouls were given a new outfit and transformed into members of the carnival.

Our skeletons were transformed to Clown-etons and decked with clown props, we included some carnival games including a strong man hammer hit.

All good halloween carnivals require a cannibal and circus wagon. This circus wagon was easy to make with a lot of cardboard, streamers and gold paint, the inner bottom of the wagon is littered with body parts and bones.

The front door was ringed with red balloons and rich red and gold panne velvet curtains.

Halloween Carnival Entry Door transformation

I really loved this plastic clown wall hanging, it went perfectly on a pair of door.

I created a set of “siamese twins” by placing two smaller halloween props in one dress and transformed a zombie into a “snake charmer”.

While, this did take time, the effect of red and gold streamers to create a circus tent pitch was amazing - when used correctly, streamers can be a very cost effective way to transform a room.

Another Freak show member was “Ivan the Terrible - Knife Man” and my smallest props were transformed into the “World’s smallest little people”.

Halloween Carnival Dessert Table

Our Dessert table continued with the halloween carnival theme with evil clown cup cakes, Clown Cookies and petite fairy floss or cotton candy treats, We created a set of carnival printables for this party that you can download for free at the end of this post.

We kept the cup cakes simple and added an evil clown topper, for fairy floss I used the Persian variety and placed amounts in small black paper patty pans on a candy stick with black bows.

Evil clown cookies completed the dessert table.

A non-alcoholic punch was created and topped with fariy floss, and our Jack O Lantern was Pennywise - This was an excellent Jack O Lantern.

Layered Jelly is always a favourite, we made personalised wine glass tags from the cake topper circles. Billy just happened to be cycling by the jelly.

We have created a free range of printables for this party that can be downloaded here Cup Cake Toppers , Food Tents, Carnival Signs and Boarder Print

This was a great party, I decided to be the ring master, attend by my fortune teller and clown.

We hope you enjoy

Owl High Tea Party

September 29, 2020 in 70th Birthday Party, Afternoon Tea, High Tea Party

It has taken me some time to post this party, this was mum’s 70th Birthday Party held at a rambling country estate over a delightful weekend. The highlight of the weekend was an owl inspired High Tea Party.

We hope you enjoy, Julie.

Our high tea included a lot of sweet delights, we made eclairs, caramel slice, lemon slice, chocolate rum balls and cup cakes, these were beautifully presented on tiered platters.

You can hardly have an owl inspired High Tea party without owl cake pops, we also made the owl cake pop nest and have the tutorial at the end of the post.

Mum has a lot of shabby chic vintage trio sets dating from the 1960’s, we also included novelty vintage teaspoons that had been collected over the years.

We created a set of out printables to compliment this party, they are available as a free download.

Petite sandwiches with classic fillings were in abundance.

Our eclectic mix of vintage trios, paired with vintage spoons were a hit. Owl napkin rings are available from our printable range.

Elegant cup cakes with Owl toppers and bright icing will brighten any table.

Our free owl printable range include bottle labels, 2 inch circles, mini bunting, napkin rings, mini toppers and food tents, they are all free to download

I really love using layered jelly, especially if you have small children, our bottle labels and mini toppers are available for download.

Tutorial - How to make an Owl Cake Pop Bird Nest

Our cake pop bird nest was quite simple to make and it added tremendously to the presentation of the cake pops, it was made using a hanging basket plant liner (available from garden or hardware stores), polystyrene circle, lots of paint in greens and browns and finally, hay, twigs and craft feathers. When placing the cake pops, use a skewer to pierce the polystyrene, and as simple as that you have an owl cake pop nest.

Step 1 - How to make a Owl Cake Pop Nest

Step 2 - How to make a Owl Cake Pop Nest

Step 3 - How to make a Owl Cake Pop Nest

Step 4 - How to make a Owl Cake Pop Nest

Chic Party Ideas - Owl Inspired High Tea

We hope you enjoyed this post, a High Tea Party is a really good option for a 70th Birthday. This party also had an amazing Owl Cake. Enjoy Julie

How to make an Electric Chair - Halloween

October 04, 2019 in diy, halloween, Halloween

This year we had an Asylum Halloween so I felt we needed an electric chair to “shock” our guests. This was our end result, it was quite easy to make and was very effective, we added strobe lighting and “electricity crackling” to enhance the realness of the chair. We hope you enjoy our tutorial.

This was part of a large asylum party which can be viewed here.

Step 1

Starting with the Electric Chair Brain electrode: This was made using an old colander, Battery operated red LED lights, Paint and an extension cord with 1 meter reserved for the cap.

Step One - How to make an Electric Chair

Step Two:

Paint the colander all over with black paint, this will take a few coats of paint, Remove the plastic cover from approximately 1 meter of the extension cord so you can use the wire (Careful where you cut as you want to preserve length near the plugs). Paint the remainder of the extension cord, including the plugs in black paint.

Step Three

Push the red LEDs through the holes in the colander and secure with a hot glue gun, twist sections of wire so they protrude and look exposed from the top of the cap, I also used wire to secure the light battery in place.

Step Four

Add the end of the electric extension cord to the centre of the cap and secure in place, I split the wire on the hidden end and tied the wires in place.

Step five

The frame was made to be secure, I found an old pallet and spray painted it black, we they made a sturdy fame of treated pine that was screwed to the pallet, we attached coasters for the chair legs so the chair would stay in place.

After lots of searching for the perfect chair we settled on a hospital style mobility impairment chair, this had a sturdy frame while having that “medical institution look”. We managed to find this in a thrift shop.

Step five - How to make and Electric Chair

Step 6

I made the sides of the chair using plastic stone wall wrap, this was secured in place using large bull dog clips, black fabric was used for the top. The electric brain cap was attached to the remainder of the electrical extension cord, we left the extension cord only loosely attached so it could be placed lower or higher depending on the height of the victim.

Step 7

Arm and leg restraints were made from wide belts, found at thrift shops and cut to size

Step sever how to make an electric Chair.JPG

Step 8

Two strobe lights were attached to the top of the wooden frame, with more bull dog clips, they were then attached to a single power source. We placed a sound track of electricity crackling near the chair that was controlled via an iPad.

Step Nine

The final finishing touchers included placing dark green velvet at the front entrance, our electric chair photo booth sign, some carrion birds and lastly an electric danger animated device that I happened to find at a local party shop. Our Electric Shock photo booth sign can be downloaded here.

We hope enjoyed this tutorial.

Asylum Halloween Party with Asylum Dessert Table

October 04, 2019 in Dessert Table, drinks, halloween, Halloween, Asylum Halloween Party

I’ve been wanting to host a Halloween Asylum party for a number of years, it is a dark theme and heavily features the morgue , electric chair and various collections from a slightly crazy psychiatric doctor, nurses and patients. We included an Asylum Dessert Table and free asylum printables.

Enjoy

Key features are our morgue and electric chair, we fashioned our morgue from an existing cupboard, we created foil covered sliding racks for the bodies and black velvet so only the feet were visible, as a final touch toe tags were attached. Our electric chair worked really well with sounds and flash strobe lighting, a tutorial for the electric chair can be viewed here.

Our morgue included a large assortment of bottled organs in both vintage and modern display jars.

Our asylum had stone walls, skeletons still chained in their chairs and an old asylum kitchen complete with vintage bedpans.

Our asylum was also plenty full of patients, all chained in place.

Our Asylum Kitchen included two blood spattered children making mince meat from various body party and organs. And our Admissions Nurse “Nurse Betty” was an imposing feature at the door.

We used a set of skulls to display the various levels or mental impairment from Lunatics to imbeciles.

We used a lot of furs and dark fabrics to transform our house into an asylum

We created an office for our mad doctor with a vintage desk, chair and lots of old bottles and books, I printed some old photos of asylums to decorate the desk

We created the Asylum Dessert table to look like an old Asylum kitchen with a lot of old vintage kitchen pieces, including crystal and leather bottles and a vintage bed pan right under the table.

Our Dessert table included Lunatic Cake pops, Mortuary Saw Cookies, cup cakes feating abandoned Asylums and Candy Corn jelly.

We made layered candy corn jelly topped with whipped cream and Mortuary Saw Cookies, dripping with blood.

The Cake Pops are Mad Doctors, we fashioned them all capes using a small and large foil patty pan papers, the cup cakes were simple but topped with details of old abandoned and condemned asylums. The circles are available as part of our free printable download.

A punch of blue eyeballs rounded out dessert table.

For the adults we created a selection of urine specimen cocktails, these were a mix of different clear spirits made with orange juice and different amounts of raspberry cordial to cause colour variation in the samples.

Light refreshments were served on our mortuary table and displayed with mortuary tools and champagne glasses with our Asylum Wine Glass Circles.

We have created a free range of printables for this party that can be downloaded here, 2 inch circles, Electric Shock Chair sign, Dessert Table Tents, Asylum Admission Sign & Waiting room numbers, Skull Types Name Tents, Asylum banner for cake pops and Reasons for admissions

This was a fun party to create but did take time collecting the many small bits and pieces.

We hope you enjoy Julie

Flamingo Party with Dessert Table

June 22, 2019 in Childrens parties, Dessert Table, Flamingo Party, Birthday Cakes

How can you resit the urge to create a Flamingo Party!. Flamingo parties allow you to explode with colour and creativity, for this party we have created a Flamingo Dessert Table, a super cute Flamingo Birthday cake, Flamingo Party Favours and more.

We hope you enjoy, Julie

Our Dessert table included cup cakes, cookies, fruit skewers topped with watermelon flamingos and jelly cups.

We included cute flamingo cookies in two shades of pink and some palm trees cookies adding to the summer theme.

The fruit skewers had a base of green grapes and strawberries, they were finished with a watermelon flamingo pressed using a cookie cutter. We included simple cupcakes in pinks and blues and topped with flamingo toppers.

Jelly cups were created in layered shades of red, we then placed two flamingo plastic skewers in each and topped with an umbrella.

Flamingo Birthday Cake

I really loved creating this cake, I found flamingo candles, perfect for a flamingo party and created a lake in a cake with blue gel, we used edible chocolate rocks to frame the lake and included some palm trees.

Flamingo Party Decorating Ideas

We managed to repurpose some of our Hawaiian decorations for this theme while adding flamingos, flamingos were easy to find in both party and craft stores.

We kept the table bright and colourful using pinks and blues an lots of flowers

Helium balloons in brights colours graced the ceiling completing the theme

Bright blues and pinks worked well for this party

Flamingo party use pinks and blues to create the look

We created a photo booth using long tikis and scene setter beach view images. A flamingo foil balloon looked really special.

Photo booth props included monkeys, flamingos and lots of beach style card cut outs.

Flamingo Party Favours

We created two favours for this party, the first was small glass jars filled with different pink candies, the other was a flamingo gift pack with a flamingo pen, pink feathers and other gifts.

Card flamingo circles and tags completed the look for our flamingo party favours.

This was a great theme and lots of fun was had by all, including the birthday girl.

PUBG Cake

May 13, 2019 in Birthday Cakes

I really loved making this cake, based on the popular PUBG game this cake incorporates many elements of game play with varying terrain, drop crates. vehicles, players, a passing plane and group chat.

We hope you enjoy Julie

To bring the game play to life create group chat messages. Chocolate rock candy and crushed chocolate biscuits are great to create terrain.

Off Road vehicles are a perfect addition to the cake, include some in a “Crashed” position. Rivers can be made through colouring edible Gel, available from cake stores. For this cake I have used plastic trees, people and cars, which breaks some cake rules but saves a lot of time.

Seafood Dinner Party with Vintage Fish Dinner Service

May 04, 2019 in Adult's Parties, dining table, Dinner Parties, free printable

For a number of years I have collected vintage fish shaped ceramics, these include dinner sets from Shorter and Sons England to some lovely Australian pieces from Wembley Ware and Darbyshire. These are all vintage pieces from 1950s or earlier and on a crazy whim I decided to see what would happen if I had a seafood dinner party using my vintage fish collection.

And it actually worked, enjoy Julie.

The table held vintage fish shaped vases with colourful bouquets of flowers, vintage fish plates, salt and pepper shakers and more. Keeping with the vintage theme we included vintage crystal glasses and decanters.

The pieces used have been collected over a number of years through various trips to antique fairs and markets and the occasional on-line purchase.

I created the menu incorporating my fish display cabinet , the menu is available as a free download . Vintage Crystal and decanters were used for this party and a Shorter and Sons Fish Gravy boat with matching pate.

This has to be the brightest and most unusual dinner party table I’ve created. It is always fun to experiment with vintage pieces and see what you can create.

Seafood dinner party with vintage Shorter and Sons fish plates

Shorter and Sons fish plates come in a range of colours from the most common cream with green gills and fins through plates in hues of greens, blues and pinks.. This party included matching name places and paper napkin rings, both are available as a free download.

Jim Beam fish decanters completed the look with another large green fish vase and small Wembley Ware fish vases.

Jim Beam Fish Decanters - Seafood Dinner Party

Fish vases allow for great displays of colour.

The Menu

The menu included four courses and ending with coffee and petit fours. Dishes were simple to prepare so more time could be spent with guests

We served two canapes, the first was a simple prawn with avacado and mayo on toasted pina di casa, this was served on a very large shorter and sons fish plater. The second was natural oysters served on a shorter and sons oyster plate rwith matching salt shaker.

Seafood Canapes on Shorter and Sons Platter

Shorter and Sons Oyster Plate with Salt Shaker

The next course was a seafood chowder, this was served in a shorter and sons soup tureen with matching lid (Not shown)

Seafood Chowder served in Shorter and Sons Tureen

Our main course was spaghetti Marinara with garlic bread, this dish looked great on the fish plates.

Spaghetti Marinara served on Shorter and Sons Fist Plate

We finished with a raspberry souffle with a hidden chocolate truffle, served in a souffle dish on a smaller shorter and sons plate. We finished with coffee and a selection of petit fours.

Raspberry Souffle served on a Shorter and Sons Fish Plate

Seafood Dinner Party Games

During the night we played a few rounds of “Guess Who or Guess What” based on different seafood dishes or sea life. We placed cards in card holders wrapped in black velvet. These cards are available as a free download.

A set of printable products were created to compliment this party, they include napkin rings, blank name tents and blank cards. Three sets of Dinner party “Guess Who” games are also available as a free download Set 1, Set 2 and Set 3.

We hoped you enjoyed our seafood dinner party.

Cheers Julie

Mexican Party with Dessert Table and Games

April 21, 2019 in Childrens parties, Dessert Table, free printable, Mexican Fiesta Party

A Mexican Fiesta party is so colourful and fun, it allows you to explode with a bright vibrant colour palate. For this party we have a Mexican dessert table, Mexican Decorating ideas, Mexican Fiesta birthday Cake, Mexican favours, Mexican games and a set of free printables so you can create this party at home.

We hope you enjoy.

Julie

We made three types of decorated sugar cookies for this party including guitars, maracas and Chili peppers, the cookie cutters were all found in on-line cake decorating stores.

The stars of the dessert table were a pair of Mexican Bull Pinatas. They graced either side of a Mexican Fiesta Birthday cake.

I always try and include fruit in my dessert tables and find fruit skewers allow you to be creative while serving a healthy treat, that said it is a dessert table so we included a set of harlequin margarita glasses from pottery barn filled with assorted bright coloured candy.

We found a cute Chili table cloth for the dessert table and decorated beverage bottles with Mexican hats and printed labels available as a free download.

Tall displays of balloons are a must at parties, I’ve included bright Mexican bull and Fiesta balloons

The ceiling was covered with helium balloons and fiesta bunting, we used colourful pink and blue glasses, maracas and Mexican party decorations.

Mexican Party Birthday Cake

The birthday cake depicted a Mexican fiesta with hanging flags, a pinata, cactus and balloons, while I have broken some rules by including non-edible components the cake was easy to assemble and enjoyed by the children.

Mexican Party Favours

This party included two party favours. We included a living succulent favour in a really decorative pot with a thank you card and a small jar of layered candy treats with a Mexican hat topper.

We painted “Fiesta” in bright colours on the candy jars, the thank you notes are available as a free download.

Mexican Party Games

We had a number of games and activities at this party including a photo booth, scavenger hunt, Guess the Jars, Pinata, pass the parcel, Mexican hat Dancing and more. The photo booth was a real hit and it was so easy to create. We used a lot of crepe streamers and attached them to the wall to create a bright stripped backdrop, we then attached a colourful boarder.

A Pinata, filled with treats provided a real challenge.

We created scavenger hunt for this party that is available as a free download. Each child had to find 8 unique Mexican themed cards as part of the hunt, these cards we carefully placed both inside and outside and provided lots of fun for the children. A prize was offered for the first one to find the cards.

We also played some traditional party games including, guess the number of items in the jar and Pass the Parcel

This was a great party and a really good choice of theme that allows you to be creative using simple bursts of colour from streamers and balloons.

This party includes free printables so you can create this look at home, Our downloads come in 2 files (Part 1) and (Part 2). The set includes:

Bottle labels in 4 designs
2 inch circles in various design
Game signs, including blanks
Dessert table tents, including blanks
Mini bunting for the cake
Scavenger Hunt Game Cards

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