His birthday was this Monday just gone be we got in early for a party last Saturday. There was no other choice for a theme but Thomas the Tank Engine - his favourite by far - but I wanted to avoid the overly merchandised decorations and make it a little more 'dandy'.
I was fortunate to find red, white and blue decorations that I could add a little touch of Thomas to. I made my own 'stickers' with circular printing labels and added these to party hats and bunting and also to the favour bags I bought from Ikea, which are intended as a sweet advent calendar but I saw them and knew straight away what I would do.
I found blue and red shoe sized gift boxes and added the opposite coloured bottle tops for wheels and these formed a party train full of fairy bread, popcorn, lollipops and chips.
The finishing touch was a Thomas cake - I made it based on the traditional Woman's Weekly train cake and several others I found online. I modelled the face from fondant from a tutorial I also found online (happy to share this link if anyone wants it just comment below), it was my first time working with fondant and I was pretty pleased with the results.
It was a fantastic day and he enjoyed himself very much which was very obvious from the mix of dirt and sugar coating all of him at the end of the day. I was also very grateful to my very generous parents in-law who helped us out with a last minute emergency venue change.
What I am most grateful for though is this little person in my life. He is turning into a little boy very quickly, he has cheek and never-ending energy but also the sweetest of ways and manners and charm. He surprises me every day and makes me feel like celebrating too.
Would love to know where you found the hats and gift bags for your party! Super cute party you hosted! My son turns 2 this coming December and we are doing a similar train/Thomas theme for his bday as well so I loved your post!
ReplyDeleteHi Kim thanks so much - your little boy will love his Thomas party mine still talks about his 6 months on. I actually made the hats and bags and bunting by buying off the shelf red and white ones or blue ones and adding printed labels. The hats and bunting I found at a discount store but party supply places have similar and the bags were from Ikea - it was around Christmas and they are intended as an advent calendar, again generic red or blue one would work - spots and stripes too. To make my own Thomas stickers I found an image I liked off the Internet and using photoshop etched around it until I had the basic front on Thomas you see. I bought round printing labels from an office supply store and in Indesign mocked up a printed sheet of round images with blue or red backgrounds and repeated them to match the lay out of the labels I was to print on - this did take a few trial and errors to line up when printing but not too many. I also made a version with my sons name instead of Thomas so it said Ryder and Friends using a font similar to the branded one. It does sound complicated written out like this but it wasn't too much trouble and I preferred the final look to the branded ones I could find plus I was able to personalize it. I hope this helps and if anything doesn't make sense let me know. Best of luck and happy birthday to the little man for December we will be planning birthday number 3 for then too. Siobhain
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