Good morning, I hope you all have had a wonderful weekend. This morning I have an adorable real party to share with you. Charley of Cherry Pie Lane contacted me recently to share her beautiful baby girls Naming Day that was also her first birthday party. I will now let Charley share Poppy's special day with you.
After speaking to a friend who had combined her daughter’s
naming day and first birthday, I figured we’d do the same. It makes the whole
thing much more of an occasion and I guess cuts the costs/planning time (to some
extent!). I knew I wanted to do something for Poppy, but a Christening just
wasn’t the way we wanted to go, so a naming ceremony held everything we wanted.
After lots of research and venue hunting, we got planning and sent the invites
out – these set the red, largely poppy based theme that we used.
Poppy’s Birthday was actually the 30th December,
but as the poor girl already has Christmas shadowing her day, we thought we’d
move her party to the 21st January. We live in Berkshire and are
covered by the Bracknell Forest Registrars. They have a variety of locations in
which the naming ceremony can be held – we picked the Syrett Suite in
Easthampstead Park.
The ceremony was fab, not too long and covered all the
promises that you would expect to hear from us as parents and from her chosen
guide parents. We had one of my all time fave photographer buddies, Sassy from
Assassynation, come and take the photographs for us & I’m sooooo glad we
did. Not only are the photos amazing, but it meant that we didn’t have to worry
about catching pictures ourselves.
After the ceremony, we chose to go to a venue that we had
hired a little closer to our home – another good call here, judging by the
amount of times I had to walk up and down the road to fetch things I had
forgotten! Being a bit of a control freak, I had wanted to do as much of the
work as I possibly could.
I chose to hire a fab
florist, Jay Archer (really, seriously fab & such a great help with the
tables too!), as I know that that is definitely one area I suck at!! Jay was in
charge of some beautiful table dressing – a fabulous wreath made using red
anemones (as a fantastic alternative to Poppies) and some gorgeous, rustic ivy,
raffia and wax flower garlands. I made up some white glazed letters, to hang
into the ivy, to spell out ‘let them eat cake’. I have since dried some of the
wax flower bunches and anemone heads to use in a shadow box frame for Poppy.
The one venture I made into floristry was making the jam jar
vases. I was so pleased with how they turned out, so simple & cheap, but
they actually looked pretty cool! I collected a whole bunch of jam jars,
grabbed up some cheapy flowers from the supermarket and trimmed them to fit the
jars. I then filled the jars with water and added glitter and sequins. They
caught the light beautifully too.
I tried to make the centre of the reception a bit of a tea
party and so I planned to have the food and drink tables as the main
attraction. I originally wanted to have 4 main tables; 1 for drinks, 1 for
savoury food, 1 for desserts and 1 for the sweets. I ended up having 3 as the
desserts and sweets all fitted on to one table, plus time somewhat dictated how
much we could actually get done!
The drinks table was adorned with a ‘Drink Me’ garland,
which was strung to hang, but looked equally nice laid in front of the glasses.
I also made up a series of ceramic labels for the drinks jugs so that people
could easily see what was in each container.
The main food table was laid out with meats, cheeses, salads
and bread – I crazily did all of the catering myself too... who needs sleep?!
The gorgeous vintage crockery and cutlery used is all from my own collection,
which I have been building out of newly acquired pieces and other bits handed
down from my Grandparents. I also made a ceramic ‘Eat Me’ garland which ran
along the front of the table.
The sweet table came together quite nicely, with the cake as
the centrepiece. I made the cake, which was triple chocolate, iced with
chocolate butter cream and covered with chocolate fingers, caramel truffles and
butterscotch discs. I then layered fresh raspberries on each tier and added in
some stunning red sugar paste poppies made by Helen of Cat’s Whiskers. I finished
it all off with a dusting of gorgeous holographic red edible glitter – this
really sparkled!
The cake was surrounded by heaps of cupcakes and vintage
china & silverware filled with various sweets. I made a load of banoffee
cupcakes, which vanished before we could grab a photo! One of my very lovely
friends & also now one of Poppy’s guide parents, made some fabulous
cupcakes decorated with gorgeous red poppies and sprinkles.
Whilst the adults stuffed their faces and filled bags with
sweets, the children got on and played with toys, tunnels & ride ons. These
were put together out of our toy collection and that of another very good
friend and guide parent to Pops!
After lots of stress, no sleep and heaps of worrying, I
*think* and hope that it all went well and that people had a nice day – looking
back at Sassy’s fab photos brings a big smile to my face anyhow!
Links:
Photography: Assassynation – www.assassynation.co.uk
Ceramic Signs & Details: Cherry Pie Lane – www.cherrypielane.co.uk
Floral Wreath and Garlands: Jay Archer Floral Design – www.jayarcherfloraldesign.com
Sugar Poppies: Cat’s Whiskers Cake Design – www.catswhiskerscakedesign.co.uk
Ceremony Venue: Easthampstead Park - www.eastpark.co.uk
Ceremony Registrars: Bracknell Forest Registrars - www.bracknell-forest.gov.uk/liv-naming-ceremony.htm
Reception Venue: St George’s Parish Church - www.achurchnearyou.com/owlsmoor-parish-church
Wow, this is a fabulous party and the details are fantastic. I love Charlie's ceramic signs, they make a gorgeous addition to the party decor. Charlie, I think you deserve a medal for doing so much of hte catering yourself, especially when looking after a one year old and running your own business! It looks like everyone had a wonderful time and I am sure Poppy will love looking at the photos of her special day in years to come.
Have a fab start to the week everyone,
Zoe
x
