DIY Mommy : #AngTwins turn TWO at Sunrise Buckets

Get ready to jump into muddy puddles and celebrate with us!

You'll probably be familiar with the phrase "muddy puddles" if you have toddler kids like us. Yes, Peppa Pig is in the house and this was our theme for the second birthday of the twins. After the big party last year, Paul and I decided to keep things simple this year for two reasons:

1) My beloved Angkong just passed away a little more than 100 years ago and..
2) We just wanted to keep this year's celebration intimate yet fun with family around.

I started planning for their birthday as early as March. Yes, not wanting to cram (which I still always end up doing) I started considering various venue options. One, a simple DIY swimming party with cousins where we can prepare fun snacks for kids and a heavy afternoon merienda for our adult guests, another option was to just eat out minus the frills and this, a party that's somewhere in the middle -- that's fun, simple yet memorable. Back in March, my twins were super into Mickey and Minnie and I thought to myself -- "PERFECT! A Mickey and Minnie theme is just super perfect for boy and girl celebrants." Then Peppa Pig and her family came into the picture and my twins are so in love with Peppa Pig and Brother George. It came to the point that they would cry if we have to control their screen time and one of their first few words was "Pa" for "Peppa". Oh boy!

So, Peppa Pig it was. I just had to make sure to give as much importance to Brother George so as not to turn the party all girly pink. This time, I learned a lot from my friend I who's one of the best DIY moms I know. She pointed me to several stores on Shopee and gave me a lot of good ideas. Months before their birthday, I started online shopping for all things Peppa Pig. From balloons to banners, from party loot bags to cake toppers.




First we started with the invites. I paid a layout artist to do their first birthday invite which I later found the design on Etsy. I wanted to cry and laugh at the same time. I just blew a couple of hundreds away for something that I could have purchased directly and edited myself. So this year, no more paid designs and with my very amateur graphic design skills, I made the invite which had their favorite characters and all the important details. The family loved it and actually asked me where I had it made. I also made sure to provide printed copies for everyone coz I'm old school that way and just so no one forgets.

If you remembered that beautiful fondant cake that we had for the twins last year, I decided that this year, Paul and I will decorate their cakes and so Paul and I went to Red Ribbon and got them a plain dedication cake each. One in mocha, another on in chocolate. I initially wanted to get them both chocolate to signify "muddy puddles" but Paul convinced me otherwise saying that the cake table will look too dark. He had a point and so we went for these two flavors which our guests enjoyed. I realized that Red Ribbon has played a special role in the milestones of our lives. From our wedding cake to the twins' birthday cake and more cakes to come in the future. Well, it's delicious, the cake is always moist and the sweetness level was just right. It's a fail-proof choice as everyone in our family loves Red Ribbon.

As for the venue, we chose Sunrise Buckets at The Grove because we have dined there several times with the kids and they seemed to have enjoyed their meals there. In fact, we were actually booked at another venue but since they had really bad service, Paul and I decided to cancel that and go with Sunrise Buckets who took care of our party and orders so well. We also got a nice area in the restaurant which comfortably sat our party of 30 guests.

The food was great as we specifically chose our favorite dishes such as the 5lb wings which was divided into four different flavors, nachos overload, Kate's spaghetti (which the twins super love), Fish and Chips and more! I appreciated how the servers took care of making sure that each table gets all the dishes and diligently refilled everyone's drinks and attended to all our requests.

Apart from the Peppa Pig toppers, I also got personalized name toppers for each cake. This was ordered from another Shopee/Instagram store called The Art Lair. Bea, the talented lady behind this brand, is such a fun and professional person to deal with. I simply just gave her three instructions : use their first names, use blue for J and pink for L and include Peppa Pig and Brother George. The finished product was so beautiful. It really completed the look of our cake and we loved it so much that we actually reused the toppers the second time around when they celebrated their birthday with their classmates and teachers. I think Paul will keep these toppers as he said it's really pretty. I won't be surprised if we'll end up using them again next year, that is if they're still big Peppa Pig fans.

The party was very casual, no program at all and it was really just meant for the family to enjoy the meal. The restaurant had toys and mini toddler scooters available so after the party, all kids just hanged out at the garden area and played. Even my twins enjoyed so much which is basically the main objective of us throwing them this birthday celebration.

I realized that creating a theme is really important when planning a DIY party because it sets the over-all look and feel of the whole party. Now that they're two, shall I start thinking of what to do for their 3rd birthday party? ;)