The first year with 2 little ones was more challenging than I like. With increased workload at office and home, I was really pretty low on energy to plan a big party. I was even toying of doing away with it but I knew I had to be fair to Avalyn. We skipped Avalyn's baby shower because of family matters and shouldn't skip her 1st birthday. So, we finally decided to hold one at the function room of my church leaders' place a month before the party and go fuss-free!
However, the party turned out nothing like what we'd planned, and in fact it was quite an eventful one - just like how Avalyn arrived more than a year ago!
Venue
Due to some booking system glitch, the function room was double booked. We had to change venue to the outdoor bbq pit at the 11th hour. We're really thankful to be able to get another venue at the last min. Hubby even thought of canceling the party for friends and ask our family member to head over to our house for a smaller party. Even though we would prefer a cooling bright function room, the warm open bbq pit gave lots of room for the children to play.
Games
We loved to keep the little ones engaged so arranged for walking animals balloons, glitter tattoos, games and bouncing castle for the celebration. And, we were so looking forward to have the children bouncing with joy. It was sad that the bouncing castle couldn't be set up outdoor. Nevertheless, I'm so glad that the children all have great fun even without the bouncing castle.
Cake
The cake from Sensational Cakes/Cakeinspiration was awesome! And it's probably the only thing that went as planned for the whole party. So much effort was put into this cake! See that little chick on the barn, that's the same design and the standee. And, it's almost coincidental that I dressed the girls up in yellow!
Cake table
Given the amount of things on my place, I would likely drive myself crazy to DIY any party decor. This time, I just focused on the decor for the cake table and nothing else. I asked brother aka my creative art director to help me with the backdrop for the cake table and design an e-invite. I sent him a photo of the set up and doodles. After which, he came back with a file for me to do the printing. We picked up the prints and was all I expected! Yes, how awesome is it to have a designer brother!
Here's our bustling full cake table set up, finished with the cute animal barn cake from Sensational Cakes/Cakeinspiration and a warm orangey flower rustic bouquet from Floral Garage! Thank you guys for adding colours to the table!
Actually, the set up turned out to be very different from my original plan. A change of venue brought some challenges to the set up of the cake table and backdrop. But, it was already a big win to get the banner up, even if it was up just for the first part of the party. There wasn't any wall or close by pillars to stick it up. After multiple attempts, the banner finally got up with velcro tapes at the edge of the overhead shelter and ribbons. I knew it wouldn't hold too long as the surface was rough. Thankfully, it fell but safely without dropping into the waterway behind or smashing the cake.
The animals standees are supposed to be by the side of a rectangular table instead of climbing all over the table. However, the big round table was what we had to make do with. It was a huge relieve that the table cloth was big enough to cover it. While the set up turned out quite different from what I'd planned, I'm very happy with how cute they looked.
Food
The food was great and many had good reviews ! A big relieve that we weren't a total bad host for the inconvenience that the guests had to go through with.
It drizzled and we had to move the buffet table to the sheltered area. By God's grace, the drizzle stopped after a few mins so we managed to keep the party going and sing a birthday song for Avalyn!
Thankfully, the party ended on a happy note. The kids had fun playing and running about at the open area; the food was nice; & the adults were spontaneous and had a good sweat without working out.
Certainly, a very heartwarming party! It's our joy and blessing to have our family and friends celebrating Avalyn's 1st birthday together with us! Thank God for holding our party together despite it being almost a real animal barn.
Many thanks to those who have helped us at the party - our church leaders, bro, in-laws and chaos guys! Thank you Elder Lim for your birthday prayers for Avalyn.
Thank you all for the presence, presents and ang baos! Hope you guys like the simple gifts that we have put together. Thank you to Wahid, our photographer, for bringing cameras powerful enough to cover our party in dim lights. We would surely engage him again!
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