Officially a Toddler – Prince Reid’s Ball

It was my baby boys 2nd birthday last month on Halloween. I couldn’t believe he was turning 2 already and I just wasn’t ready for my baby to be, well, not a baby anymore. I made sure to send out invites super early, with his birthday being on Halloween I wanted to get in there before people booked that weekend up with Halloween parties. I made the party at lunch time for a few hours so people could still do the normal Halloween stuff later in the afternoon and evening. People assumed I would do a Halloween theme but I promised myself I would not do that on his birthday until he asked me to. Because his birthday is on Halloween I can see him getting older and saying he just wants to go trick or treating with his friends and not have a party, so I want to do proper birthday parties for as long as I can whilst he is still young.

My family and I don’t do small parties and always go overboard. Having such a big family who are all so close means everything is always big! My mum also owns an event management company and she basically plans big parties and events for a living! Combine this with Reid being absolutely adored and spoiled by everyone, especially his Grandparents it was only natural that he was going to have an amazing party!

I have been to lots of children’s parties where you turn up at a play area or similar, the kids run off and play whilst adults sit and chat and there is that child/parent divide. These parties are fine and for some parents can be a nice break and a chance to sit for a while. However I have always believed that birthdays are meant for celebration with all the people you love and want to spend time with, so this kind of party for me just didn’t make sense. I am sure when he is older and he wants all his friends from school to come to his party and all their parents attend who we don’t know, a play area may be the best option and may be what he wants. However whilst he is so young and everyone who attends his birthday is someone special in his life (adults and children) I wanted us all to be involved in his party.

The theme was really simple for me, I went for something I knew he would love and something that everyone could enjoy too. We went for a Disney theme and asked that adults and children dress up (if they can and wanted to ofcourse). I decided on my son’s favourite character (and secretly mine too) Elsa from Frozen. The boyfriend got a Spiderman suit as apparently Marvel is Disney (you learn something new every day..) and my son, with him being the most important at the party I decided to make him prince charming! I liked the idea of him being a prince, throwing a ‘ball’ with lots of Disney characters attending. The only problem we had was, there was nowhere that sold a toddlers prince charming costume, I couldn’t believe it! Even the Disney store used to sell one years ago which was amazing but haven’t sold one for years! All these lovely princess dresses in the store and not one prince costume. Which I thought was quite rubbish from the Disney store. All the boys costumes were just Superheros etc.

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I searched ebay, online stores in America and just couldn’t find anything. So I turned to my aunty who has been known to make our fancy dress costumes in the past and my cousin’s costumes. She is fantastic at making clothes but doesn’t do it as her job but more as a hobby when she can. She was delighted to make it and did it at his birthday present which was nice. I didn’t get to see the costume until literally the night before his party, I was absolutely over the moon. It was beautiful, practical and exactly what I had wanted. It was something special that he could keep forever and she had made it really comfortable for him, much better than the plastic-y fancy dress costumes you normally get for kids. He looked amazing and he loved wearing it which was a relief!

The venue we originally picked was just a local community center and we were going to do up the big hall with the stage and hired a performer. We booked it well in advance, again with it being on Halloween and paid a deposit months before his party. I received a phone call with only 10 days until his party to say they had double booked and they were cancelling his party, with absolutely no apology. I was absolutely devastated and couldn’t believe they had left it so late to tell me about an event they have going on every year and had forgotton about. Luckily my mum came to the rescue and sorted us out the most amazing venue ever (she managed to pull some strings) and with roughly a week before the party I had to contact every person coming to let them know of the venue change. Such a waste of invites!

We had the party at Whitworth Hall Hotel and deer park in Spennymoor, which is where my mum is organising a big Christmas event starting this month. The hotel is beautiful and the grounds are even more stunning with the lovely deer wandering around. This truly was a fairytale venue for my little prince and I was so happy to be having it there. The function room went well with his theme which was good because otherwise it would have been a rather grown up room for just a children’s party. But it looked very royal so made the party look even better.

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 We hired 3 mascott characters (Anna, Olaf and Mickey) to entertain and dance with children to Disney songs for the first 45 mins and my son was just in his element. He wouldn’t leave Mickeys side and just wanted to hold his hand all the time. It was so adorable and he had the biggest smile ever. We also had older children decorating balloons to look like Mickey mouse and then had the food, where Prince Reid was at the head of the table sat in a throne. We also provided food for adults and had so many people come up and thank us because you don’t normally get food at children’s parties yet the parties are normally always over lunch time. I always think thats a bit cruel making everyone come to a child’t party at 12pm-2pm and not providing food. Once they had finished their food, the second half of the party was about to begin. The curtains opened and there stood the performer with a huge amount of impressive balloons. He did a funny show that was for all the adults and children to be involved in and it was hilarious. He got children up joining in including Reid and gave every child atleast 1 amazing balloon. This definitely wasn’t your standard balloon modelling, there were life size balloon models, balloons with things in and he even transformed people in to fairies and pirates with balloon wings etc. He was Prince Reid’s royal Sourceror doing magic tricks and really entertained everyone.

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After the performance was over we did the birthday cake which was also amazing and made by my very talented mum. We then handed all the children party bags who were also made by my mum and filled by myself and my partner and also handed them a bag of Reindeer food each. We all went outside and fed the Reindeer and it was just so nice, everyone was so happy, it made me feelt quite christmassy too. The performer even came out with a puppet to further entertain everyone and the party just couldn’t have been more of a success. Reid got a huge amount of presents, and was absolutely exhausted bless him, but he had really had the best day ever.

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Lots of people will probably read this and think, I’m mad and think what is the point of a huge party like that when he is two, he won’t remember it. He may not remember it in the long term, but I will always remember that smile, that laugh, that lit up face for the rest of my life, I will look back on the photos when he is older and doing things without me and smile, and remember his amazing birthday. So it is something that can mean a lot to all of us forever. So forget super sweet 16, and have a super sweet 2! I definitely couldn’t have done it without my parent’s, especially my mum, who was just amazing. She sorted everything from the venue, the cake, theprops/decor to making sure everything went smoothly on the day. She knew I had a lot on with buying our first house and she totally saved me!

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 Links

Whitworth Hotel

She’s Gott It Events