MMM party - favours & printables

With the help of some clever friends, a bit of Pinspiration and my extensive collection of vintage bits and pieces, I really didn't feel the slightest bit of stress over Eleanor's party (other than feeling a tiny bit stressed that I wasn't stressed).  Really.

Favours:

 Paper doll stickers and a candy necklace

 and handmade (by Alice, not me) flower cookies, packaged in polkadot bags

I kept the favours much more simple this year.  I loved going to all that effort last year, but I wasn't feeling it this time around.  

 Packaged in glassine bags from Pop Roc Parties, with a little floral bag of old-fashioned sweets to take home too...

I chose the theme several months ago, and ran through lots and lots of ideas for what I might do with it. In the end I referenced the books in these ways: red and yellow jellies (as MMM had at the birthday party she went to), blackberry tea-cups, an Eleanor-as-MMM illustration I created for the invites & printable hats (I never actually sent the invites :-/), and Eleanor's red and white striped dress - which was actually just a happy, thrifted accident.  Other than that, we did our best to stick to a similar era for most of the decorations, which were all from my collection.

Fruit cups, with a little surprise at the bottom

When planning the menu, I stuck to simple and rustic plates (bread & jam, cucumber & cream cheese sandwiches, fruit cups etc).  I created a little board on Pinterest to gather ideas, and sketched out how I thought it would all look set out.  I figured out what decorations/items I would make, and what I would buy, and then designed an invite.  And then I didn't think about it for weeks and weeks.

 Free printables :-)

On the day of the party it was raining so we couldn't do the egg and spoon & sack races I had planned, so I prepared a Pass The Parcel the night before, and when the 3 year olds started getting noisy and restless we played that. No prizes between the layers, and in the centre there was a spotty balloon for each of them.  What followed was six very happy children, who filled the room with balloons, noise and happiness.  Simple.

Some Pinspiration I used:  Toffee Apples with twigs as sticks, Posie Gets Cozy's gorgeous cake, washi tape flags, party hats.