We survived!

I didn't stop after the last post. It was all sewing, buying, working, child collecting, phone call making, food assembling and cooking etc etc etc.....

But we've made it out of the other side of the weekend! The small person's party went really well and I got lots of compliments about how well organised it was, what a great idea, and how fun it was. At least I did when the parents realised I'm Alexandra's mum and not my friend Simone! Everyone pitched in with setting up and food which I'm very thankful for.

My sister offered to bake the cake (which is great, 'cos I had very little time and I'm not very good at baking. I have a go, but I'm more of a savoury girl) and then I decorated it. The poster got painted, the bunting got finished (which I love!) and the small person's costume was finished with plenty of time to spare.

I made her jacket from some fabric donated to the crafting cause by the lovely Potato Salad Heather (and The Boy) decorated with black felt I already had and some gold buttons from my nan's button tin. The gold lace I bought from the market. She wore her own blouse which I added lace cuffs to (which can easily be removed to return it to everyday wearable status) and her wn brown cord skirt. I bought her a tricorn and stripey tights from our localfancy dress shop and a pirate kit (sword, eyepatch and hook) from the £1 shop. Mr Bogert had the eye patch for his costume, and she just used the sword. Luckily she had new boots for her birthday, and after putting her hair in rags on Friday night to sleep in (the old fashioned way of doing it) she had lovely ringlets to complete the costume.

Ragged hair to make ringlets

Probably the best photo of me in my "costume" from the day. Yep, that's me, that dot in the distance......

I borrowed my mum's long brown skirt and wore my white gipsy skirt underneath as a petticoat. I wore my brown boots, a black vest top with my cream ruffled blouse over the top, a scarf tied around my hips and a scarp of the striped fabric I'd used for the bunting as a head scarf. My costume had the least amount of time spent on it, and there are no proper photos of me. Funny how that happens.

Mr Bogert wore one of his white summer shirts with black trousers, a scrap of the black and white striped fabric round his waist, a printed bandana round his head (left over from his younger years ;D) a stick on beard and moustache from the fancy dress shop, the eye patch from Alexandra's set, and a leather waistcoat I made from more donated fabric from Potato Salad Heather and The Boy. He looked quite piratey.

Anyway, more about the party later.

The Christmas Tree Festival. Shockingly, with everything else going on, we actually managed to get the tree's done on time. Toddler group tree was pretty much ready, but we needed to sort and print more photographs for the photography club. Friday evening we went to the church to decorate. There were so many trees already decorated and it was so nice eeing everyone's themes.

Photography Club Tree - Images of the Village (Lots of photos of the village, village events and local people taken by our members)

Toddler Group Tree - Toddler Group Angels

We returned Saturday afternoon to see the whole church filled with trees and lit up (after clearing up from the party). We took part in a quiz about all of the different trees, the small person (still in her pirate gear) had a hot chocolate with marshmallows and decorated a biscuit, which didn't last very long once covered with icing and sweeties! Mr Bogert and I took photos of the various trees and had a mince pie and mulled wine. I do believe it's beginning to feel alot like Christmas!