A Pot of Gold at the End of the Rainbow

I very much hope you all donned on your green and got in the Irish spirit to celebrate St Paddy's day this weekend. We certainly had a busy St Paddy's day this year celebrating not only the day of the saint, but also a little girl's 10th birthday. Definitely one of the more unusual birthday themes we've encountered, but we rose to the challenge and with leprechauns, pots of gold and rainbows in hand we set off to create a memorable birthday for the child who shares her special day with the Irish saint.


With St Paddy's Day being celebrated largely with the colour green and beer, we had to take an alternate route to make the party kid friendly. This is why we decided on leprechauns and the legend of their pots of gold at the end of the rainbow.


For the invites we kept it simple with leprechaun hats, but to add a little something extra we stuck magnets onto the back in the shape of pots of gold. This way the invite could go on the fridge, a constant reminder of the upcoming event. 

On the day of the party greeting all the guests was a friendly leprechaun waving everyone inside.

The rest of his friends were to found inside hiding in the shrubbery.

 

Apart from the jolly leprechauns we also had plenty of rainbows. Over the entrance to the party we had a giant rainbow for the guests to walk under.

We also had a freestanding rainbow that we used to add a bit of colour and party spirit to the pool area. No party is complete without helium balloons and we really made use of them to add colour and theme to the whole outside party area. Each of our bunches contained seven balloons displaying all the colours of the rainbow with pink having to replace indigo. We used little cauldron pots as the balloon weights to act as the pots of gold tying into the theme.

Of course our party table couldn't go without being "rainbowed" and so for the centre piece we had a rainbow that went into two pots of gold. We also had the birthday girl's name on the rainbow which we painted gold and sprinkled with glitter to really get the idea of gold glittering in the sun. In the pots we had gold organza and some gold chocolate coins. We also used cotton wool underneath the pots to create the effect of clouds.

                                                          
                                                      


For the cake the client wanted a big green leprechaun hat. This was my first attempt at actually carving a cake into a shape and I was pretty happy that it worked even if it was a really simple shape.

The only other party food we provided were some cupcakes that of course also fitted in with the theme.

For entertainment, although not theme related, we hired a surf simulator, a similar concept to a mechanical bull except the kids need to stay balanced on a surfboard that rocks and sways back and forth. They absolutely loved it. We also hired sumo suits which were a huge hit in more ways than one. The kids basically climb into giant padded fat suits and need to sumo wrestle each other. A whole lot of fun for everyone including the spectators.

The party packs were made from green organza and black tissue paper. They were filled with gold chocolate coins so that each child took home a sack of gold after their St Paddy's Day adventure.

Farmtastic Fun

In event planning there is no such thing as an easy event and our first party of the year definitely got us off to a galloping start. We thought we were in for an easy ride when we booked a horse riding party at the local stables, the kid loved horses it was an easy fix. Well, so we thought. Unfortunately a broken arm is not such an easy fix and with this happening to our poor birthday girl just one week before her party we really had to become work horses (sorry that was a horrible pun) to get everything done. 

Not wanting to stray too far away from what we originally planned we decided to stick with the animals and have a farm themed party. Luckily we were able to secure a new venue at the beautiful Kirstenbosch Cottages where there is plenty of space for the kids to frolic about. We also organised to have a mobile petting zoo come to the party as entertainment, something the birthday girl could easily be involved in with her broken arm. The package we booked was the baby animals and it was definitely a good pick. Baby chicks, ducks, bunnies and rats kept the kids fascinated for hours and we were pretty in love ourselves. It was very difficult to say goodbye to our new Vanilla Milkshake mascot, Minion.

Being out in the open meant, apart from some hay bales, décor wasn’t really necessary to achieve a farm feel, but we made sure our food table, party packs and cake embraced the new theme with still having a touch of the horsey that the birthday girl originally wanted.

Party Table

The party packs we designed to look like little barns. We used ordinary red party boxes and added roofs and big barn doors.

And of course what is a barn without hay, so we had a little bit of hay sticking out of the barn window.

  

Each party pack had a farm animal that doubled as a thank you tag.

We weren't required to do much themed food, but we did decorate these yummy sugar-free lollipops with some farm friends.We also made some rice krispie treats in the shape of horses.

For the table decoration we used the animals and barn again and created these in a scrapbooking style. We placed each one in a pot with a bit of fake grass and a white picket fence. 

For the cake we wanted to keep the birthday girl's favorite animal the centre of attention as planned, but we also added a few more of the other farm elements to fit in with the theme.

At the end of it all with a few alterations to the original plan the party was a success. We certainly enjoyed it...