Our first birthday party! Space Party!

It has been a while since my last post! And this new post will be very different from my last one. I shared a very personal side of my life... There is so much that I need to share, but bot today.

Today I will be sharing a brighter and lighter side of these past months. It is always a pretty busy holiday season for us,  besides Christmas we have two birthdays to celebrate... That's what happens when both your children are born around Christmas time, one just before and other after Christmas day...!

And today I will be writing about how we planed my oldest birthday party, and how we decided to celebrate birthdays which happen during the Christmas holiday. I do know that there are many blog posts sharing fantastic birthday parties, with extraordinary decorations! And yes, if I had a never ending budget I would love to offer one of those parties to my 6 year old boy... However our budget is limited, and we have to keep our feet grounded and not go crazy -  and  I only managed to do this because of my well grounded partner... I am very addicted to Pinterest and it was incredibly hard for me to keep this party within reasonable, and more practical limits. But it is difficult isn't it? As a parent you want to offer your children all their dreams! I am thinking about this party for a very long time,  my plans concerning the decorations, children's games and entertainments  as well  our party food are thought  far in advance  -over 6 months - so  we would not be stressing about it later. I used to take a quick pick at all sale items in stores as Hobby craft to look for bargains. All the decorations were made by me as well most baking. So the amount of work to do closer to the event had to be planned carefully and with a steady timeline so I would be doing things  with enough time. It helps that my partner was the one grounding me to earth, and reminding me about the time, so I would not loose myself!

But one step at the time! One of my goals was to have both of my children realise that even with the Christmas season their birthdays were important, special and different from our Christmas celebrations. As most children, they were quite excited about Santa Claus' visit. We decorated our home for Christmas and both kiddos helped us out. So, on their birthdays I made a bunting and we had extra large balloons with their age, to mark their birthdays. These days are special, its a celebrations of their birth, of the time they are in our lives and they are treasured. Even if in the midst of  Christmas season, which we all love, these days are so much more cherished!

And... back to my my oldest party! We also wanted to offer him a birthday party with all his little friends from school. It would be quite impossible to have a birthday during the holidays, so we planned his birthday party to  happen once school started, during the weekend. Since his birthday is happening during winter time we knew that the party would be happening indoors, ready for any weather. So, we had to rent out a large room with enough space for the children to run freely and able to cope with a large bouncy castle! We searched online for this and rented a large community room close to our home. We did this 3 months prior to the party due date, and we had to move his birthday celebration for a Sunday since our preferred Saturday date was already taken... So lesson learned renting the room have to happen with more time to avoid any disappointments...

His birthday party happened on a Sunday, during the first weekend after school resumed. The invitations were distributed during the last week before Christmas holidays so that the children's parents could rsvp with time. In the end my oldest party had 20 of his little friends attending!

Our party was space thematic, as space and the planets are subjects that our eldest is eager to learn and talk about. Our invitations were made by me, I used Canva for this. And all the little planets and stars that were featuring in the invitation were also used to make a little bunting to hang in the room, by an opening from where the food would be later available. Apologies for the photos as I was so busy on the day I had no time to take any good photos! 

The bouncy castle that we also rented was coordinating with our theme, it featured a few aliens and rocket ships!

I planned for a 2h party, that started from 14h30 until 16h30. I also draw a schedule of the party that I discussed with my partner so we both had a rough idea of how the party should happen. The first 30 to 45 minutes we figured that the kids would be entertained just by jumping and bouncing around! I  planned  for three games to happen and for the children to have enough free play as well - basically having time to play with the bouncy castle. Having a bouncy castle takes care for the kids never ending energy,  and its the centre of all the children attentions, they are immediately drawn to it! So after decreasing a bit of energy with the bouncing castle I started the scheduled games that I had prepared. The first one was my 'Moon rock hunt'.

Moon Rock Hunt 

This was an adaptation of the well know 'Treasure hunt'. I made 20 moon rocks, basically  paper balls wrapped in aluminium paper and hid them around the room. I made 20 moon rocks altogether,  5 yellow moon rocks, 5 green moon rocks and 5 blue rocks (see below).

Previously, whilst the kids were arriving, I gave them 'Space cadets' badges that I also made with Canva, so that the kids were in different teams, yellow, green and blue. 

The blue team should search for yellow moon rocks, green team searches green moon rocks and so on. The general idea behind was to make the search an effort to foster team work and to make it a little bit more difficult. They should be searching for specific moon rocks. I also made some signs that spread oround the room pointing the children to the spots where the moon rocks would be. If planning this seamed easy, practically the minute the kids realised that there were teams, they wanted to be in specific teams! 'I want to be on the blue team'... 'I want to be on x's team'. The minute I started to listen to this I got a little bit panicky! I immediately dropped the teams ideas and quickly said: 'no worries children! If you want to search with x, do it, and search for the colour you want'. Immediately the kids started to run all around the room  searching for the moon rocks! That was the main goal in the end, having them running around  the room actively searching! Not soon after I was surrounded by my many rocks! I quickly counted and there  still two rocks missing! Quickly shouted, 'Kids only two yellow rocks missing! Keep searching!' And they kept searching the room! After finding all the moon rocks there were a few sad voices 'I didn't find any rock' that I had to dispel, 'Its ok, this was a team effort! You were looking for x colour and your team found all of them! There are more games to play, don't be sad.'

Note: with 20 children this game took about 10', with the kids finding 20 moon rocks.

And then its time for my second planned game, 'Land the rocket'!

Land the Rocket 

Land the Rocket is an adaptation of  'pin the tale on the donkey'. I made the game myself reusing old cardboard boxes. I wrapped in space themed wrapping paper a large piece of cardboard. 

I printed a large moon from Canva, as same as the moons that  featuring in the invitations and the paper space bunting and glued in the centre of the cardboard. I then printed about 30 small rocket ships from canva and cut them, attached double sided tape and placed them in an envelope and stick it on a cardboard frame. And this is a picture of the end result, after the kids landed all their rockets!

Note: With 20 children this game took about 30' to finish. Some children were able to land a second rocket.

After this game it was about 16h, and it was time for snacks. The children quickly ate, and after another round with the children freely bouncing in the bouncing castle it was time for the last game, pass the space parcel.

Pass the space parcel

 This was simply the 'pass the parcel game', where the parcel was wrapped in a space themed paper. I wrapped small bags of sweets in wrapping paper, added more bags of sweets and wrapped again repeating the process over and over again. I did this twice, making two large parcels. This was the game that was more difficult for me to manage... I had to pay attention to the children that are very slow to pass the parcel as pay attention to make sure that  the song stops at a time that there's  new kids holding the parcels! Every child has to have a turn at opening the parcel.... And I had to manage two parcels at the same time so that the game would not take ages to end.... I was lucky that a mum that stayed at the party was helping me out at this, she could see that I was having difficulties! I let a kid  open a parcel twice which should be fine if you have loads of turns at 'pass the parcel', .... but we did not have so many sweets to let all the kids have second turns.  All it was fine in the end...The children also step in and started to say who already had a turn!

Note: With 20 children and two parcels, this game took about 20'.

And after this game it was cake time! It was the last event and with this we are pretty much at the end of the party! 

And at this point we barely had time to sing 'Happy birthday' and have the birthday cake! My oldest wanted a chocolate cake, which was great as the chocolate icing would be great as more  space than a featuring little white chocolate stars....

And we are pretty much at the end of the party....!

I was really scared about this first party to be honest... Will the kids have fun? Will they get bored? What can I do? But just the bouncing castle would have been enough... Just bouncing around is great fun for these little guys!

We also handed party favours when the children where leaving the party, a paper bag with light in the dark stars, a space pencil and a space rubber! 

Our half term: We went on a bear hunt!

How was your half-term? I know this was a couple weeks ago, but it has been really difficult to sit down and update my blog. Nevertheless I am catching up more often than use to!

Our half-term was spent at home, but we were able to do a lot of activities... The local libraries and our local art gallery were offering diverse holiday activities for both toddlers and young children. I do try to be creative and to come up with crafty things for both kidos to do, but if I can have the fun and have less mess up to clean up afterwards, the better. So we went to our local library, we read lots of books... And for crafty things we went to our local art gallery and made some pinatas! However,  our favourite activity was attending for the very first time the Nuffield childrens' theatre, which was featuring until the 2nd June 'We are going on a bear hunt'!

The kidos absolutely loved the show, and to be honest so did mummy! The activities and the excitment began even before the show. The Nuffield theatre prepared an actually 'bear hunt', a treasure hunt really. We could ask at the ticket office for a map to look for bears around  Highfield Campus. My oldest was so excited to follow the map and find the bears! My youngest, its just fun to run around tailing his older brother! The actual 'bear hunt' was a fun way to release some energy before the show! And it was also educational, not only had my oldest to read a map, as the bears had letters and we had to form a word. And after finding all the bears and the missing word, it as theatre time!

The show was really engaging, with catchy songs  -  which until today are sang 'we are not, not not, not not scared!'

The dog was absolutely delightful to hear sing, extremely funny  and so very expressive therefore it became instantly the favourite character for both kidos: wof...!

I was concerned that since my youngest since he is only two, that staying for almost an entire hour watching a show might be too pushy, particularly since he is really active. However, as the show was full of surprises, splashes and so engaging that the  hour went on a flash, and both my oldest and youngest were attentive following the show. The actors  began by asking what does a bear look like, which every kid was so excited to answer and explain... The contributions were dutifully noted... Nobody has seen a bear live did we? 

 Every now and then in the middle of the show we could hear a bear roar. A footprint was also found! All kids were eager to let dad, girl and boy about it! This kept my kidos inquisitive, so where is the bear? Did you see the footprint? Mummy did you hear a bear? Unsurprisingly, the best part for both was when we finally met the bear. My youngest screamed with delight when the gigantic Teddy Bear made his appearance on the stage.... He could not stop saying 'Its a bear' 'Its a big bear' 'Muuuuummmy its a bear' he was so happy! 

We all loved this show... And we are definitely going 'On a bear hunt' when given the opportunity again.  Here is a sample of the show:

Since we enjoyed going to the theatre so much we are also making plans to watch another show! Actually, it was the kids that when seeing the 'Gruffalo' said that wanted to see that show as well! And we most certainly will!

xx

Friday’s Thoughts: Tales of invisible children.

I am writing this post because  I was shown and read recently about a case that happened in Southampton no more than three months ago. A case where a newborn baby, merely 5 days old, was removed from the parents guard and that may be post to adoption (or might already have been adopted). Of course, parents are fighting with all their strength to get their baby back. I can’t possible imagine what these parents are going through. I simply can’t.

I have read so many news and have seen so many controversial (as this article about an Italian mother's c-section and its more comprehensive counter-part) articles on the media about Social Services and child care.  Naturally, getting the facts straight is difficult if not impossible when dealing with such sensitive situations. Nevertheless I still want to believe.
I want to believe that the UK has an honest and sensible Social Service at work.
I want to believe that the Social Services in Southampton are truly looking out for the best interest of the children living in their council.

It is terrifying to learn that a newborn can be removed from parents (and looking at past cases, even from the mother’s womb!), with apparently no reasonable or well backed up reason, or at least not known. One thing is to act and to ensure that all is well with a baby, to accompany and monitor the situation. Other thing entirely different is to permanently remove a child from the family care and place him/her for a closed adoption - a forced adoption.

I ask myself, do Social Services  have enough evidence to take this action?
What are the alleged reasons that could justify such extreme act?
But there’s no known answer. And the public will never know.

And this is the key factor of what is wrong with this current child protection system. All cases that involve children and go to Family Court happen behind closed doors, surrounded by secrecy,  and no-one will ever  learn the grounds behind these decisions which leave devastated families behind. Parents are gagged, and cannot tell their tales.
Social Services and the Child Protection System have all the power in these situations. Some may even go so far to claim that few Social Services cases are corrupted, files changed or go missing to back up their claim over the child.  A well known MP also states that parents never get an honest family trial and goes so far to recommend parents to flee the UK with their children if possible, once Social Services are activated. An underground network is already set to support families in these situations, to help them leave the country and start a new life abroad.  We end up reading about parents losing their children in the news, as this one or this similar story from before. But in fairness, the aftermath shown in the media only portraits one side of the story. The family side. We never get a chance to learn the side of the Social Services, and the whole truth is hidden behind ’the need for confidentiality’.  This  also prevents any scrutiny regarding Social Services proceedings, including finding of any real evidence of effectivity for these same actions. Any event has no accountability, in any way. 

It is  also well known the reason why Social Services may be so quick to remove a child from their parents care. They wish to prevent a tragic and heart-breaking case as Baby P. Social Services got persecuted and scrutenized in the media for failing Baby P. But we have to be cautious when attributing the blame, and even more when attempting to avert past mistakes. Policy changes and reforms when needed to happen have to consider  the realities and the complexities of the social work, and some claim that recent policy changes  have turned social workers into managers and away from the field work. Acting fast, although with weak evidence can only lead to disaster. Moreover when these measures are permanent and tear families apart.

Which brings me back to the first case I started to write about. A newborn baby was removed from his family care by the Southampton Social Services. I feel for the family, truly feel, nevertheless I don’t know the reasons claimed by the Social Services to act. I want to believe that there was a credible cause to proceed so radically. The family however claims that the reason behind the baby’s removal  are adoption targets that the Southampton Social Services may have to meet, which is also rewarded with fostering grants. However, these same targets are disputed by social workers, as a recent article also shows that adoption rates are falling due to court rulings.

Unfortunately, I will never know the truth behind this story. Until Social Services processes and Family Court are transparent, the public will never know. Nevertheless, and unarguably,  the UK shows a clear unbalanced situation in the child protection system, where state and professional workers have more power than parents but without accountability. It is also  known that United Kingdom is the only european country where forced adoption happens due to ‘risk of emotional abuse‘. If I understand, and completely agree that the welfare and well being of a child has to be paramount in any given situation, I also believe that any parent has the right to defend  their family in a fair, well-balanced and transparent system.

I can only hope that these invisible children, that are not known and whose family life is devised behind closed doors are truly given the best future possible. I just know that  parents and families are left distraught and feeling prejudiced.
Rightly so? I don’t know.

Want to know more?

Personal website about the social services policies and work through the eyes of a previous social worker: The Barefoot social worker blog

Dispatches episode which describes child protection procedures and practices in the social care institution :  Dispatches - The undercover social worker

Community web site about the Social  Services: Community Care

Documentary through parents’ perspective whose children were removed  by Social Services: Traffic

Documentary that exposes forced adoption cases: Exposure - Please don’t take my child

Baby and me: 10 Things that babies love that would surprise you!

 I am always amazed at the things my baby finds funny. He remembers to do stuff that I would never ever imagined that he would ever think about doing....

1. The Unbearable Lightness of Barefeetness

No matter how cold the floor is, the first thing my baby does when he has some socks on...
                                        Do his best to take those off!

I feel that I am always putting his socks back on...

2. Dirt!

He is surrounded by cute toys, but the thing that catches his full attention is...

The tiniest scrap paper on the carpet.

If I knew this, I would have spared a lot of money on toys...

3. Technology!
Again, he is surrounded by toys. But the fascinating thing is:

  .....your remote. Your mobile... your laptop.
   Every single piece of technology, fully functional of course, he is not interested in any remote without batteries, or your laptop turned off.

4. Take stuff out of drawers...
           .....and shelves...
                          ......and boxes...
                                   ........mummy´s bag.......

Just take stuff out of somewhere.

I spend the day tiding up after him....

5. Unroll the toilet paper.
 How fun!

Particularly the aftermath, when mummy is re-rolling it all over again!

6. Pull mummy´s earrings.
    He loves this particularly my earrings are shiny! Don´t ask me how my ear lobes survive, but yes, they are still intact. There must be something genetic passing through each generation of mothers to increase earlobe surviving skills, because I have no idea how mine are surviving motherhood...

7. Pull mummy´s hair.

  Also, he smiles a lot and laughs  at mummy's painful expression when pulling her hair!

8.Doors!
   How fun they are! They have thingies on it, you can move it, and open it and close it...! Oh adventure! And what about closing and open doors!? A M A Z I N G

9. Glasses!

 Retrieved on Picjumbo

Oh the fascination with sunglasses.... My baby always tries to remove my sunglasses, and he just laughs when I put my glasses on him!

10. Look up!

  Retrieved on Life of Pix

My Baby loves to see things in the sky, as birds or ceiling as his mobile and lights... See whatever is above him...!

What about you? What does your baby love to do?

 

I am linking up with these amazing bloggers:

Planing for a Baptism!

I am facing an unusual amount of stress lately (besides my PhD, being a new mum, returning to my research and caring for my demanding little one), and why is that?

Because we (my other half and myself) decided to baptize our little one in less than three weeks. Oh yes, you read it correctly, we have less than three weeks time to prepare the Baptism ceremony!

So, we have virtually no time at all to find a space, caterer, a baptism outfit, and all that is necessary for this celebration... Yes, that is true, I am aware that basically all that is truly necessary is to attend the mass, the celebration itself and be there with your little one and the godparents.... But this is such an important celebration that I really wish my family and my close friends to be there, and that means... me and around 50 or more other people! So, as you can imagine I am facing an almost impossible task ahead! 

But so far so good. Luckily I have some really supportive people behind me, my other half, my parents and in-laws, who are being truly amazing, really supportive with all these preparations. And we are lucky, at least one space and caterer are available in so short-notice time frame. Unfortunately the one space that we really want is a no show so far. We are still waiting for a reply!

As I was getting some inspiration from around the web, I found several inspirational blogs, about party planning and party decorations. As my other half would say, I really like to complicate things, meaning that I would really like a pretty celebration for my baby boy. I already managed to create the invitation (and all the invitations were already sent by mail). So I am going with a blue and white themed party. I won’t be able to have a gorgeous celebration with amazing decorations as I am seeing around the web, but at least I will try to have a coherent look whenever possible. These ideas will only be finalized once I have the space and caterer settled....

And here is what I am picturing for the day:

How about you? Did you ever had to plan a celebration in such a short amount of time?  

 

Nursery wall art!

 

Today I will be posting about some projects I have done awhile back.   When I was thinking about the nursery for my little one, one of my favourite projects was his nursery wall art. If you are following my blog, you might have guessed that I absolutely love painting and drawing...

For inspiration I use many different sources!

One of my favourite animations movie is “My neighbour Totoro”. I have to say that I absolutely love Hayao Miyazaki (宮﨑 駿,Miyazaki Hayao) animation movies, but “My neighbour Totoro” is a special one, it might have to do with the story which is so heart warming.... So this would be a normal source of inspiration for my nursery wall art. 

 

These are characters from the movie, Totoro, the forest spirit and dust bunnies. These drawings were quite simple to do, I just used Canson paper and coloured pencils! The frames I bought on Ikea.

In the background you can see another project of mine, my sihlouette birds. I posted awhile how I made my silhouette birds....

And now just a little note...since my glider is showing in this picture.... I have to say when I first saw some gliders, I didn’t like at all its style, or how they looked like. But, now, I absolutely love my glider! It’s so comfortable!! And the little bench that comes with the glider just adds more to it, when nursing my little one the glider was one of my favourite spots in the house. A few months ago my little one got some fever, and I practically spend a whole day in my glider, gently rocking him....It was the place where he would feel more comfortable.

So, thank you so much mum and dad! My glider is simply a marvel!

Now a close-up of the elephant and little bunny drawings...

I am going through an elephant phase, so elephant wall art was mandatory. These elephants are based in watercolour paintings made by Carolyne Tillery, she owns a shop on Etsy, you might want to check OhHellodear shop! I absolutely love all of her watercolours! To make my elephants I also used canson paper and coloured pencils as well. I also delimited the drawing with a black pen.

When I was thinking about decor projects for the nursery, I thought about keeping it neutral.., But after a while, when I knew I was having a little boy, the colours that I was choosing just naturally started to be dominated by blue tones... After a while I just gave up about neutral tones...

Do you have some favourite  wall art projects?