Millie Turned Three and a Tiger came to Tea

Ironically the genesis for Millie's party this year came from her second birthday. My friend Aranka gave Millie 'Mog and the baby' by Judith Kerr. Millie loved her  book and I found this and the other Mog books to be a delightfully strange time capsule, the different  parenting style from another era ( unsupervised babies crawling onto the road, saved by rogue cats!) and the beautiful illustrations which capture a by gone era, the green kitchen chairs being my most favorite.
Anyway the enjoyment of Mog led to Santa delivering The tiger who came to tea last Christmas and if it had seemed as if Millie loved her Mog books, the tiger took things to a whole new level. For the first half of this year it was her most beloved book and everyone in our family has had their time of reading it to her  over and over again, when Millie was sick, feeling sad or just after a snuggle and a reading marathon.
 So, when I started thinking about her party this year, inspiration struck and I realized how well the book could be adapted to be a party theme. MIllie has mostly been on board with this as theme , I have to be honest and admit than in the past couple of months as Princess fever has hit her with ferocity she has had moments of wanting a Princess/Fairy/Ballet party, but my reasoning was there is plenty of time for this in her future. So The Tiger who came to tea: Tea party, it was to be.


The Invitations

I wanted something inexpensive and in keeping with the old fashioned home made vibe of the story, so I needed to look no further than my resident junior artiste Ben, who created his own fabulous replica of one of the books illustrations. I then scanned his picture into the computer and uploaded it to pic monkey, where I customized it with text to transform it into an invitation with all the party details. I printed an laminated a set of the pictures and then cut up some magnet mat to place on the back. Voila we had beautiful invitations that will forever to me capture this stage in my children's lives and they probably cost less than  fifty cents to make.

The Cake

 It took me a while to decide on the cake, I realized a few years ago after making a few that I am just not into fussy fondant cakes, to me they become more of a sculptural center piece at a party that everyone is too afraid to cut. In my humble opinion a birthday cake should be pretty but more than that it should be delicious and edible! I decided to try making a chocolate and orange marble cake to hopefully achieve a tiger style twirl.

It was not looking too promising with a burnt cake top when one of the cakes emerged from the oven, but I got a sneak peak that all might be well when they were cut to level them. I sandwiched them with chocolate ganache and did a crumb coat of vanilla butter cream. 

I should have done a trial but in the weeks leading up to the party I simply ran out of time so it was a breath holding moment  when the cake was finally cut in to and thankfully it turned out exactly as I had envisaged. The decorating inspiration came from Sweetapolita and I watched this you tube video several times

I know I have said this before but the i Pad has to be any cooks best friend, it is so useful to have recipes and tutorials right there in the kitchen with you.

I think it turned out well for a first attempt and Millie loved it.

The food

I put my little artist to work again to make the Tiger Food tin labels

I wanted to keep the food simple and went for high tea style offerings. I made lemon curd and coconut cupcakes, mini lemon tarts, melting moments and a dairy and gluten free brownie. For savories there were home made sausage and veggie rolls, mini caramelized onion and feta tarts, mini quiche Lorraine and ham, egg and spinach tea sandwiches, and of course tiger food for our most anticipated guest. And yes, I spent ALOT of time in the kitchen in the days before the party, not complaining though, making party food is so much fun.

The Decorations and Party Bags

I enjoyed this part so much and many and hour was spent on Pinterest and the Internet rabbit warrens it led me through. I wanted the decoration to be in keeping with the muted vintage colors featured in the book and the first purchase I made was a scalloped bunting made from vintage sheets that I bought from A stitch of vintage on Etsy, it arrived and was beautiful and perfect and set the tone for the rest of the decorating. 

I loved the scalloped shape and followed this through with the treat bags and then  I stumbled across  some gorgeous paper tags at Sweet Vintage on Felt. When I got all the treat bags ready and put them out on the table they looked so beautiful I wanted to keep looking at them, yes, I am weird like that! 

Anyway, I am not big on treat bags, and I had bought them only to put the tails we made as party favors into them, but they did not fit, so in the end they housed a bag of home made pop corn and a Freddo frog. The tiger tails were made last weekend, I found the tiger printed felt at Spotlight and had some wadding in my cupboard. In a happy coincidence Aranka had just picked up a new old Bernina from a Trade Me purchase and the very first things sewn on it were these tails. Last weekend, the kids her and I had an interesting time making tails with no pattern but they turned out fab, she even made a mini tail for Pin the tail on the tiger.

The Activities and Entertainment

I could not find much inspiration on the web for the party but in my trawling I did stumble across some mask print ables. So, I set up a mask making station in the porch, all the children seemed to really enjoy making their own masks. We also played pass the parcel and pin the tail on the tiger. The tiger poster was a late night effort from John the night before the party, he a great job. I am very grateful that I have such awesome family and friends who helped me to bring my ideas to life. 

But the piece de resistance had to be the visit from who else but the tiger! Uncle Tim sourced and picked up a costume and heroically donned it on the day to come to tea. MIllie had not idea who was lurking inside the suit and was completely hoodwinked into thinking that the actual tiger had come to her party.  Isn't that what it is all about? capturing the  the childlike ability to believe in magic, I think we nailed it.