Ambrosia Turns One

 

My gorgeous little bohemian babe turned one recently and I have been holding back on the spam so that I can post it all at once here. I have had many messages so I figured I better pull my finger out and write the blog. All the photos are from Ira Cook, a gorgeous little photographer whom I recently met in a mummy forum and I was so happy with how the photos came out. She capture lots of candid moments of the guests as well as all the important things (like me… kidding). Ambrosia loved her and the rest of the time I didn’t even notice she was there. Her site is called Cookie Snaps Here are some of my favourite snaps.

For my sons first birthday I made the rookie mistake of going OTT (over the top) I had a face painter, balloon artists, hired kids trestle table and chairs, organised art and crafts, elaborate lollie table, jumping castle and slide…. and being kids, they dropped off like flies in the lead up and on the day (insert cash flying away emoji). So this time I spent the money where it mattered most (food) and created low-key fun activities for kids. I mean they’re kids right? My kids are happy to play with a cardboard box and some crayons. Our playroom was a free for all, I pulled out every ride on toy we had, a hula hoop, our chalk board table, I stuck some plain white paper along the fence with a tub of textas (which they loved and I got to keep all their scribbles and notes as memories) and I hired a jumping castle from local mum Let’s Bounce

I made her invitations and a banner on Vistaprint. I usually get something designed and then just print via them but they had quite a cute collection of bohemian inspired floral themes that I didn’t need to this time. This was one of their standard designs. I initially wanted to hang it as a back drop but I ended up hiring the flower wall back drop from Flower Walls By Dimi so I decided to use it along the garage facing the street for guests to see upon arrival. Almost all of the other decorations were purchased from Little Boo Teek I got: Love Foil Balloon, Rainbow Unicorn balloon, Unicorn DIY kits, Mini Confetti balloons were used on the cake table for decor, as well as grass mats (which look so real, they leave dirt where they lay), mossy rocks, floral wreaths (beautiful ones, nothing like the poor quality you find in those $2 shops) and wood slices which were great! they even made my cheap Woolies cakes look “rustic” as well as using them for height on my cake. The cake I made myself. I made a promise that I would always make my children’s’ birthday cakes, no matter how busy I was. It was just a plain vanilla cake, I made 2 and layered them with butter cream in between layers (I made them pink just for some colour) and then I slathered on Betty Crocker ready-made icing, which is delicious and saves a whole heap of time. The cake topper was from Etsy Cutesy Lala I only made one other cake, a “why bother” gluten-free, dairy free, blah blah and would you believe it… it turned out really yummy and it was from a packet and not a slice left! Donuts were also from Woolworths and the macaroon tower was from Sweets For Tilly I also made some “moist chocolate cupcakes” I just googled a recipe and piped on some flowers (it was my first attempt but they turned out ok)

The huge number one was a rental from @mpletterlights on insta and also doubled as a great photo prop. I decided not to do a lolly bag this year but would rather something the children could take home and hopefully use in their room and who doesn’t like wooden decor. I got these cute wooden bunnies from Koch & Co., the lolly pops were from a discount lolly shop down my local strip and I just tied them together with a ribbon. The kids loved picking a short and fat or a long and tall bunny/lolly pop. The hoop decoration I saw on a few pintrest pictures I had saved in my phone and figured they wouldn’t be too hard to make…. WARNING: They’re hard to make. I spent over 3 hours hunch backed twisting artificial flowers around hula hoops and then wrapping the whole thing in ribbon and ended up crawling into bed at 3am that night looking like Quasi Moto. I kept seeing images in my mind of a meme I had seen once that went something like this, “I could have bought it for $20 but I decided to buy everything myself and make it for $300” The flowers and berries were all bought from Ebay and Koch & Co. (I repeat, do not use cheap flowers, it will ruin it)

As mentioned earlier I got the event catered. It just meant I wasn’t running around serving everyone on the day and cooking the whole day and night before, resulting in me missing out on actually mingling and enjoying the party I put together. We love our Greek food and it’s a “safe” cuisine amongst our relatives but we thought we would try something different this time and went with Cypriot Street Food Grill The food was beyond amazing, everybody was raving about it, plus it helped people find the party easily as they could just follow their noses from down the street. It was delicious, home cooked food, a spit and they made my life so easy on the day. I just supplied all the disposable plates and cutlery so there wasn’t even much clean up.

My daughters outfit was in the making for a few months prior. A gorgeous mummy all the way over in Greek made Ambrosia and I some matching mummy and me sandals. I was so confused as to what I wanted she spoke to me about my theme and put together these beauties for us. They were leather with a dusty pink elastic fabric and Ambrosia’s pair had a few flowers attached to them. I was actually surprised at how many people noticed on the day but they were definitely a talking point on her chubby little legs. Her store is called KandElphy and I also got a nice natural organic tan from TanMe Organic who conveniently came to me the night before.

I also had a few palettes lying around the garage and I used them as seating in the backyard with a few woollen “flokati” (shag) rugs over them. These rugs were also made by my grandmother and I am actually glad I am using them rather than letting them collect dust in the closet. Things like that were just special little touches for me.

Hopefully I haven’t missed anything and if I have please just leave your question in the comments below and I’ll get to them. Hope you loved it as much as I did.

Thanks for sharing this special day with me. Love Zoe- xoxo