Party Season....and so it begins.

As many of you know, I have six kids. Their Birthdays start in September and finish in January, with Halloween and Christmas in between.
I did not plan this very well at all, and so from September onwards I am very very busy with parties, at least one per month.

The big twins birthday come first.
As they are Girl/Boy twins, we have the same dilemma each year. What theme are we going to go with?
Last year we had a carnival theme. I turned my front yard into a carnival which included stalls with pluck-a-duck, tin can alley and hoopla. The kids had lots of fun and they had a Merry go round carnival birthday cake and dessert table too. Sadly we were burgled not long after and my camera was stolen along with ALL of the photos from their birthday.

This year the twins decide on a Harry Potter theme party. We are massive Harry Potter fans in our house.  We have been lucky enough to visit The Wizarding World in Universal Studios and my eldest even got chosen for the Wand Experience in Olivanders which really made her holiday magical.

So for the past few weeks I have been sourcing my Harry Potter props in order to transform my home into Hogwarts for the day.

I have grand plans for the party including a Sorting Hat Ceremony, in which each child will be sorted in to their houses. Then on to the Triwizard cup. This will involve the houses taking part in Harry Potter based games to score points. I am transforming my living room into the Gryffindor common Room. This is where the children will get to visit the dessert table. I was going to go for the obvious HoneyDukes style, but after some thought, I decided I wanted it fit in with the setting in the Common Room.

I have been making Hogwarts hanging banners to decorate with, and intend on having the children enter through platform 9 3/4. We will see how that one turns out.

The invitations took a while too. I spent hours in the craft shop on my hands and knees trying to find the right kind of paper. Then I spent hours searching the internet for the best font to match that on the actual envelope Harry receives. I ended up using a combination of five fonts.

I included a replica acceptance letter for Hogwarts, but included some details about the party. I also inserted a map of Diagon Alley with our home address on it.
The bit I struggled with the most was the sealing wax on the back of the envelope. Let me just tell you, using a regular candle does not really work. Find a shop that sells proper sealing wax.

Right well here are some photos of the Hogwarts invitations. hope you like them, the kids sure did.
Love Natty xxxx

 

 

Ooh La La France

France.
Our holiday.

Liverpool and the Summer

As I said in my last post, the summer holidays can be a real struggle with six kids to keep entertained.
As our family is so big, days out tend to cost us a small fortune.
On average it costs us around £100 for one trip.
My husband and I decided this year that we where going to try and find FREE days out locally.
We took our children to various places in Liverpool through out the summer. One of the best days we had, was when we visited the New Museum of Liverpool.
We took a packed lunch and sat and ate it in the sun outside the Liver buildings.
There were lots of pigeons around, and the kids had more fun chasing them, than they had doing anything else all day. It was free, simple and lovely.

Another free day out was going to the Beach.
We drove over to West Kirkby and had a pleasant day building sand castles, eating ice creams and getting sand in our knickers.

Free days out are the best xxx

Hi everyone.
I know it has been a awfully long time since I have written a post, I am sorry.
The summer holidays this year was a challenge, especially since the babies are on their feet and into absolutely everything. Trying to keep six children entertained for six whole weeks is no easy feat.

We were lucky enough to have our holiday this year in France and I have got some lovely photos to share with you soon.

Today's post though is to tell you all the exciting news about my website.

It has finally gone live.

 

http://www.halfdozendesign.com/

I am really happy with it, but would love some feedback.
I have tried to make it user friendly and designed it in a style I love.
I did all the images and art work myself, which has made me learn new skills and work in new programs, so I am pretty pleased with myself.

Please do pop over and take a look, and let me know what you think of it.

Love for now
Natty xxxxx