Vintage Style Tea Party

It's no secret that I absolutely love all things girly and pretty. But with a house full of boys I rarely get the chance to embrace all things pink. So when my niece turned 8 earlier in the month I jumped at the chance to throw her a little afternoon tea.

I decided to go with a simple, pretty, vintage style afternoon tea and absolutely love how it turned out!

The other thing that I loved about this little party is that it was completely stress free. Normally when I throw a party (no matter how prepared I am) I end up yelling orders at my poor family members as we rush around getting last minute jobs done on the day of the party, before turning on my party face as the guests arrive. This time I did it all with an absolute minimum of fuss and it was a nice change!

To kick things off I made this sweet little invite for Ava. I just threw it together in picmonkey and then wrapped it in a doily and some bakers twine. Ava was so excited when she saw it for the first time!!

The main feature for the table was these tissue paper poms. I used pale pink, peach, cream and white and made them in various sizes, then used bluetac to stick them to the wall.

To complete the table I added an old birdcage that I spray painted white a few years back, a cloche with a sweet white ceramic bunny sitting on a pedestal (which was actually just an upside down egg cup and pretty pink and gold saucer), and some silver teaspoons with pretty bows tied on them.

The food elements I used were a two tier cake (gluten free and iced with fresh whipped cream), milk in vintage style milk bottles with pretty pink paper straws and fresh strawberries on a pink and gold cake plate.

To finish it all off I included chocolate bars wrapped in pink and silver paper and take home bags (brown paper bags topped with white doilies).

{How much do you love their tutus!! My very clever sister made them.}

Ava's face when she saw it all set up was priceless!! She was so excited to be the guest of honor :).

We had one little activity at the afternoon tea party - cupcake decorating, which the three kids absolutely loved. Ava showed elegant restraint when decorating her cupcake, while Max and Emmy went nuts with the sprinkles! I cheated on the cupcakes and made the worlds easiest cakes, I'll share the details on them later in the week. You will be amazed at how simple they were!

After they decorated (and ate) their cupcakes we sat down down with the grandparents for milk (and tea and coffee) and cake.

A sweet afternoon for a very sweet little lady :).

 
xx Tamsyn

Bunting Gift Tags

Today you can find me over at Hubby Made Me, sharing a quick and easy DIY for these adorable bunting gift tags.

Happy Thursday :)

xx Tamsyn

The Sleeping Saga

Lincoln is now 7 months old and still waking to feed 3 times a night. Nine times out of ten the reaction I get when I tell people this is shock and horror.

But is it really that uncommon for babies to still wake in the night at 7 months?

I've been given lots of advice, everyone from my real life and online friends (who's advice is always appreciated), to my hairdresser, beautician, shop assistants, the ladies at the post office, childless men (always my fave!) and complete strangers.

Most of the advice we've happily ignored - like starting solids early (this has been suggested to me by at least a dozen people starting when he was only 4 weeks old), supplementing his night feeds with formula (I have no problems with formula, Max drank it from 5 months but a lack of milk is not the problem) adding a few drops of rum to a bottle for him, and ignoring him outright when he cries during the night.

Some of it we've tried - waking him up to feed at 10pm before I go to bed, giving him solids at 6 months, moving him into his own room (which we did a couple of days ago) and picking him up when he cries, hugging him and then putting him back down.

It doesn't matter what we do he still wakes up in the night and wants to be fed.

The thing is, I'm totally ok with it. Sure I complain sometimes, especially after a night where he's decided to feed five times, but generally I don't mind.

I love breastfeeding Lincoln and those night feeds are so special to me. It's just me and him. During those feeds I am the only thing in the entire world that matters to him. And there is something so amazingly wonderful about that.

So next time someone asks me if he's sleeping through yet, I'm not going to let them offer me any more advice. I'll let them know that he doesn't sleep through the night, but that I don't mind at all. I'm sure he'll do it when he's ready.

xx Tamsyn

May on Instagram

Things are a little crazy around these parts right now...  I'm looking after my boys, running my shop, blogging (albeit sporadically), doing the 12wbt and all of the associated shopping and cooking that comes with it, looking after my little niece (whilst my older niece is in hospital), and I've also just started back at uni. I'm so busy that I can barely find time for pinterest!!

Somehow I can always find time for Instagram though, it's by far my favourite social media hang out :)

If you're on there come and find me, I'm always on the look out for new insta besties!

xx Tamsyn

Baking with Grandma

This weekend just gone my Mum came up to visit. We had such a great weekend, shopping, cooking, eating and celebrating a late Mother's Day as well as both her and my birthday. The absolute highlight of the weekend was Max and his cousin Emmy helping mum make a cake. It was beyond adorable watching the three of them working together, cracking eggs, blending up the limes, mixing it all together. Emmy and Max both took their jobs very seriously and mum managed the whole process with the patience of a saint!

Mum is an amazing baker and the cake was delicious. Perfect parts tangy and sweet. I will definitely be making this one again.

Here's what you need if you want to make it yourself.

375g of Limes (13 ounces)
6 Large Eggs
225g of White Sugar (8 ounces)
250g of Almond Meal (9 ounces)
1 teaspoon gf baking powder

1. Grease and line a 20cm (8inch) spring form tin. Preheat the oven to 190c (375f).

2. Place the limes in a pot of water and boil for 2 hours. Drain, and when cool cut in half and remove the seeds. Blend up the limes, skin and all, in a food processor.

3. In a separate bowl beat the eggs and then add the sugar, almond meal and baking powder, mixing well. Add in the blended limes and mix again.

4. Pour mix into your tin and bake for one hour (you may need to cover with foil after 40 minutes to stop the top from burning).

5. Allow to cool slightly before removing from the tin, then serve warm with fresh cream.

(Adapted from this Nigella recipe)

 

Nigella says that the cake tastes even better the next day, but ours didn't last that long so I have no idea if it's true or not!!

xx Tamsyn

PS My mum is just about to start her own blog!! I'll let you know when she starts writing posts :)

Lincoln's Half Birthday

My sweet little baby boy isn't a newborn anymore. He's 6 months old, full of beans and into everything!

Lincoln is such a happy little guy now that I almost forget how much of a rough start we got off to.

The first two weeks after he was born were absolutely beautiful. We spent 5 nights in hospital before coming home and whilst he screamed a lot and hated sleeping right from the start I was in that delicious newborn place where everything was perfect. I fell in love with him from the very moment that I laid eyes on him, and in those first two weeks I remember loving when he would wake up to feed in the night because it meant I got to spend time with him.

During those two weeks I was also filling orders for my shop and planing and throwing Max's party and I think I was running on pure adrenalin because the next four weeks were the hardest of my life. Lincoln wouldn't sleep at night, he would feed and then scream for almost two hours, then finally fall asleep only to wake up and hour later and do it all over again. Every single night. On top of that Max started waking up crying each time he heard Link screaming and the only thing he would want was for me to come and lie in his bed with him. So some nights I would leave Sean with a screaming, inconsolable baby and go sleep in Max's bed for half an hour at a time before feeding Lincoln again. It was hard. I took it all out on Sean and would get so angry with him. I think I did just as much screaming and yelling and crying as Lincoln! To his credit Sean took it all on the chin and just keep on trying to help me settle Lincoln, night after night after night.

I was also having a really hard time feeding Link, I had so much milk and it was coming out so fast. He was gulping down so much air with each feed and seemed to have really bad tummy pains. I hadn't been able to feed Max past the four week mark and really wanting things to be different this time, so Sean and I set the goal of making it through to 6 weeks of breastfeeding and then seeing how things were then.

At the six week mark everything seemed to change. My milk started to settle down and Link was finding feeding so much easier. He started to go straight back to sleep after each feed and started to have one four hour stretch of sleep each night. I made the decision to talk to my Dr about how depressed I was feeling and noticed that my outlook changed right from the minute I decided to talk about it. I started to fall in love with Lincoln again and was finally enjoying being a Mum of two.

Since then things have just been beautiful! Link teased us by sleeping through the night a couple of times when he was around ten weeks, but it didn't stick. He generally wakes up to feed 3 or 4 times each night, but he goes straight back to sleep afterwards so it really isn't too bad.

At about four and a half months he started trying to crawl, which was crazy!! It took him about 5 weeks to work it out and now he crawls around everywhere and gets into everything! He's also worked out how to sit up and he loves it. He will often just sit in the middle of the floor smiling his adorable gummy smile at everyone and everything. He's just started to pull up on furniture this week so I don't think he's got any plans to lie around and be a little baby.

He loves Max and Sean, but I am by far his favourite person in the world and that makes me so happy. We have this beautiful bond and I am so glad that those early stressful days are behind us.

xx Tamsyn

Max and Emmy Being way too Adorable

Last week I mentioned that I spent the weekend on the Gold Coast for my Dad's wedding, and showed a couple of photos of Max and Emmy being adorable. And now I'm excited to say that I have something ever cuter to share... a video of them walking down the aisle holding hands :)

Probably completely boring if you're not family and I thought about not sharing it, but it really is so gorgeous!!

Feel free to skip to 2minutes 15seconds to see the real stars of the show (sorry Dad and Cathy!).




I'm so excited to see the professional photos and video now :)


xx Tamsyn 

ps the baby screaming in the background is Lincoln, he must have been feeling left out

pps I've gone from having one gorgeous and thin sister to having three of them, too bad they're all too nice to hate ;)