Getting the pixie dust ready

I love parties, I wish girls remain the age they are now. And it'll also means my age is halted too right? *winkz*

Theme : A Tinkerbell and a Pirate makes a Magical 5 party
This theme was on my mind last year, but because majority of her classmates are boys, it would be too feminine. So it was put on hold and had to use this pretty theme this year. But since we still had a majority of boys, had to incorporate something. Peter Pan birthday supplies were discontinued for a long time, thus next best solution would be Pirates.

Thinking about planning and executing parties make me so excited. I want to make it bigger than the previous year/s. This year, I wished I had the Sleeping Beauty Castle and fireworks (like in Disneyland) for this Tinkerbell party. I said wish - where's my Tinkerbell? Oops! I should be looking for the genie instead.

Venue : The Polliwogs
No second choice when I knew her party would be a go-ahead. This was the venue I had wanted last year. And I must admit, no regrets.

Taking up packages reduces our hassles, but it also means there are certain restrictions. Having a party outside means no mess in our small home; no need to look under the bed for small lego pieces; Barbie shoes etc... but it also means we have to lug every heavy items to the place.

At first I took a package and asked for (additional) photographer and a face-painter. But after that I cancelled those 2 as I realised that to have a face-painter means cramping face-painting and games at the same time. And the kids would be more eager to queue up for face-painting instead. Try not to overwhelm the kids. I don't mind the photographer but KZ offered her help. Though she's no professional but might as well right, coz' she would be very free.

I did not use Polliwogs birthday invitation cards but personalized my own. I love this simple card! And it so happens that she has a photograph taken with Tinkerbell in Disneyland recently. All designed and printed within the same day I booked the venue. Talk about efficiency!

The Invited Guests

The birthday girl chose her invited guests. We're never short of guests coz' she has many friends from MMI, St Hilda's, music, Shichida, abacus. But it can be difficult to narrow down considering that we had to include some siblings. 17 was the magic number I told her, to work around this number. Can't have too many too coz' I'd have problem doing PR with the mummies and daddies.

Final list :
Current School
1. Her boyfriend and his brother
2. The other inseparable trio, girl from K2 and her brothers
3. Her classmate and her brother from St. Hilda's
Previous School
4. Her good friend
5. Another good friend and his brother
Shichida
6. Long time friend and his sister

7. Another friend from Shichida
When I asked if she wanted to include anyone from her current school, some girls she play with and how about her friends in music class. She didn't want any. Total number of kids including her - 16.

Okay, with list finalised. I was then able to do my purchases as there would be some stuffs more suitable for the older children. What older children you ask. They're the girls from che-che's school.

Click, Pay and Wait
Online purchases were within 2 days. And I was disappointed that some place ran out of the items I was eyeing and then I had to go through the search engine (again). The last time I went to recce about was a month plus back.


Parcels came in. Mr Postman more busy than ever, he notices the trend too. And guess what?! His first time meeting me after so many years. Haha!

Here comes Parcel #1. Mei-mei's happy that finally her party is taking off. Though they have no idea where the party will be held.

The parcel consists mainly the boys stuffs

Parcel #2 : cupcake rings, pirate bendables toys, tattoos

Forbidden food favors

Was so tempted to order the Tinkerbell and Pirate PEZ candies which we don't get to see in SIN. They were so cute but didn't coz' I thought of the cost and practicality in giving something which eventually might be junked by the parents. *teeth grinding*

While waiting for the parcels to come in, I embarked on the preparation of food favors. I kept food favors to the minimum.

Tags done and scored

I love this tag!

Wrappers designed, printed and wrapped on every chocolate bar. Can see where I took this picture right? In the car. Spent few fugitive days outside lugging penknife, cutting board (like I was going to kill someone like that), double-sided tape (to tape down my victim), plastic bag to throw dismembered body rubbish. While doing all these, I was so worried chocolate might melt in our heat, so have to make sure I don't let them sit under our hot sun and chose on days when I don't have to wait for che-che outside her school.

So pretty. And I love the papers too! I managed to get these papers, though bought only a stack to try out first. Dunno if can find the papers in Singapore, will try to recee when I have the time.

Pixie dust -This may seem easy to find, I thought it was. I remembered seeing it in Umeya and went to 3 outlets, they didn't have it anymore. One last attempt, I went down to the party shop in Raffles to check out and found it. Happy! But the only problem was they didn't sell the smaller ones so I had to re-pack them. Double work for me, I had to spend time to print the labels

Hershey's Nuggets wrapper printed out and wrapped

The final products.
Tinkerbell pack consists of one bar of chocolate and the fairy 'dust' candy
Pirate pack consists of one 'gold bar' of chocolate and three Hershey's 'gold nugget'

This parcel #4 came extremely late. The first to be ordered but last to arrive. My main parcel is here!!

Such a big box but ..... haiz!

The rest of the stuffs. I can start my assembling work

Tags that were prepared and ready (a long time ago) to be tagged to their bags and boxes

Packing the favor bags

For boys : Their goody bag consists the same items for both older and younger boys
1) Bandana
2) eyepatch
3) telescope
4) sticker
5) craft kit
6) pirate figurine

Parcel #3

Mei-mei offering to help me with the packing.
Top pic (R) : For older girls
1) Coin pouch
2) Terry ponies
3) Lanyard
4) Sticker
5) Bubble wand
6) Pencil
Bottom pic (L) : For younger girls
1) Colouring book
2) 2x Terry ponies
3) Bubble wand
4) Pencil
5) Sticker
One of the item went OFS, and had no time to make anymore purchases, so put 2 terry ponies inside

Right down to the details. Cutlery packs also prepared. Oh! Had to match the green and purple colour.

This one also. Personalized bottles. For these bottles and cutlery packs, I printed on normal papers. To use my chocolate wrapping papers would be too wasteful.

Snacks for display
Pretzels with the same co-ordinated colours. Just that I prefer that kind of soft colours, should have been bolder huh? Oh! For these pretzels, I cannot take credit. I tasked my helper to help me as I was juggling with the girls' schoolwork etc.. She did a great job, didn't she?
Then Polliwogs emailed me when I gave them a breakdown what I'd be putting on the table for guests. They said no food items unless it's part of the goody pack. Sigh... okay, double job (again) Had the bags at home so luckily didn't have to buy but then had to make the labels, packed up the pretzels. Sigh..

Cookies that I've ordered for the older girls from my baker. I wasn't sure if I could have a party for them so ordered this in replacement as a cake. Although we went ahead with the celebration at Scoops of Art, they were given one each. Most disappointing thing was that my stand did not arrive in time, couldn't make use of it. Had to make a stand out of styrofoam box. But I was so pleased with it - can't bear to junk it away.

Lil' girl been waiting for this time. She helped to fill up my pinata. Very disappointed with the size. I didn't have many sweets for the kids, instead selected carefully over the candies. Loaded with more treats which consisted of tattoos, erasers, confettis and bendable pirates

I had been pampering the kids at our parties. Too much pinata fillers. Remember the year where che-che's carriage was way too heavy coz' I put in so much sweets?

All's done and packed in less than 2 days for the big day. Both girls are fluttering about, they're excited over the party. And mei-mei never stopped telling me "mummy, I want a bouncy castle just like Johannah" since her party. I kept it as a secret, I was sure she would have a great time in that 'oh yes, it's definitely a much bigger castle than Johannah' castle. She's the star tomorrow and she'll love her party for sure.

Birthday @ Scoop of Art

A small-scale celebration for lil' girl with all her che-ches.

Staff was really prompt in replying my email queries. I didn't tell the girls where we were heading. Mei-mei was kept in the dark though she kept asking why I brought along some goody bags etc..

Collected her cake at PP. Was between two minds if I should inflate some balloons. In the end, didn't do it. But I bought a pinata, didn't want to destroy the Tinkerbell pinata coz' I need it the next day. And since I couldn't use the cupcake rings on the cake , I put them inside the pinata. No, not me - it was the girls who helped to put in the goodies in the pinata while I drove to venue.

I did very little setup, the staff helped me alot coz' I parked the car illegally at the library area.

Came back to see this nicely set up. Che-che also helped me.

Here, mei-mei was getting impatient

Che-che's friends came. 3 of them couldn't come as they were ill. But they allowed me to bring back the crafts for them.

Here, the girls were playing a few games. Which mei-mei didn't understand and was simply enjoying it in her own miniature world.

Finally, they get to do their fabric painting.

Cute lil' boy, Greg. I love his smile! The smile that melt your heart ... Mummy and daddy will have a hard time next time

The pretty girls

The beautiful ladies

The food for the children

1) Nacho chips

2) Honey glazed chicken

3) Chicken ham spaghetti

4) hotdog

5) Fruit punch

6) 1 scoop of ice-cream

The mummies ordered their food from the menu. Very short get-together time but still we had our laughs

Mei-mei's funny snail

Che-che's ducky

Mei-mei was so nice, the co-ordinator wanted to leave.And mei-mei told her "you cannot leave. I haven't cut my cake yet."

The birthday cake. No more chocolate coz' not many kids like chocolate

My happy lil' girl

A group picture

Birthday girl blowing out her candles

SMILE! Children

"Make an Angry Bird face" - they still look so charming!

With her co-ordinator che-che.
Giving out goody bags. Didn't manage to take pics of her giving out goody bags to the che-ches coz' they were too fast. Old woman liao - not so nimble like them.

Girls finding ways to entertain themselves. They were trying to carry a girl and then the mummies saw it and told them it's wrong and did the right way. All I can say is thank goodness che-che didn't go up, she will break their arms

Selecting their ice-cream flavour

Mei-mei and her favourite Cookies and Cream ice-cream

Pinata time!

Pouring out their loot and doing exchange

What happened to my parcel?

From the time hubby gave mei-mei the go ahead with the party (we are mourning over the loss of our FIL), I did a quick click on all the online purchases.

Two weeks after I've clicked and paid, I didn't get any news about my parcel in Vpost USA. Initially I had thought the huricane blew my parcel over to Artic. Three days wait was an agony for me. No news!

I checked with the party shop purchase history. My parcel had been sent out long time ago. My other parcels came in one by one, even those that were purchased at a later date, reached me first.

I was getting all so panicky. My main parcel is still not here! I've only got like 2+ weeks before the big day.

I emailed the party shop, UPS and enquired. The last info was "LEFT AT PORT". Immediate reaction was "what port"?! My imagination ran wild and I imagined my parcel left out in the rain, in the sun and perhaps it really got blown away. Then I asked "who's port"? Haha! I sound really stupid
I'm thankful the party shop was so nice to go the extra mile in getting the scanned copy of a signature and a name for me. (when they told me I should call them but I explained that I would be calling in from Singapore. Telephone charges would cost )But it got me really worried, then where the heck is my parcel. Maybe the guy ran away with my parcel? Okay, at least I have the black and white. So the 'port' means my Vpost address.

Meantime, my contigency plan would be - NO CONTIGENCY PLAN. Haha! I'll just probably put whatever I have inside the bags first and then give them later after the party, should they arrive after the party

Called Vpost and staff was helpful to call US for me. They said there was an additional number infront of my VP number on the box (which I checked later everything's correct) that's why couldn't track and match the customer. Oh my! The staff did a manual match for me, said I can make my payment the next day.

The next day I made payment and still waited for a few more days. Why is my parcel not moving at all?
My postman was really kind too, he told me he'll help me keep track of my parcels and he will take it out for me as soon as he sees mine.
I called them again to check on the parcel, it's only a week to the party. I need my pinata!!!! I need my favors!!! Staff said she'll expedite for me. The next day, I received the parcel. And that next day is today!

Yes! Time to start my factory assembly line.