Cows, Chickens and All Things Country.

Less than one month to go until party number 2, 'A Weekend in the Country' and I have a lot to do:

Finalise the guest list and complete the invitations,
Collect some more wicker picnic baskets,
Make a LARGE paper machie cow (unless anyone has a real one I can borrow...? Sheep....? Goat....? Pig...?)
Collect some children to come to the party, or maybe I could just invite them.
Purchase the CD's and vintage glassware, enamelware and china.
Buy a new cake stand to replace the one that I broke in the carpark of Big W after a long day at work.
Beg and Borrow wooden trays from family
And buy shares in a balloon company before I buy the required amount of balloons required for this party, which is probably enough to make a small child airborne.

HOWEVER;
I do have the tables and chairs needed, except the armchair,
I am very happy that Target and Big W has awesome girly gumboots that I hope people will purchase to get into the swing of the par-tay
AND, being a teacher, I have more than one blackboard.


In addition to this, I am really looking forward to cooking
- Blood orange, radicchio and frisee salad with orange blossom dressing
- Pork sausage buns with red plum relish
- Picnic bread with cheddar baby figs
- Macadamia and lemon fried chicken
- Roasted potato salad with preserved lemon and fresh herbs
- Iced chocolate cookies
- Marble cakes
- Jam tart with berries
- Fresh Lemonade with blackberries

Therefore I had best get everything else into order so I can get into baking! (and look up an anti-rain dance that works only on the 4th of September. I'm sure Wikkipedia with have one...

Pass me that picnic rug please...

Gumboots. Cows. Cake. Armchairs. They all go together don't they? So as you may have guessed I have decided on my next party. The swans have flown away, the angel wings returned to the angels and the kitchen mess from the previous party is now a mere memory. During a recent trip down south I was inspired by the rolling hills of Bridgetown and the numerous cows, sheep and alpacas of the South West to host another of the parties in the book Food, Fashion Friends by Fleur Wood (see earlier posts for the link to her website and book). The party in the book is called 'A Weekend in the Country,' and, in the book, it was a birthday party for the Author's husband. However I don't have a husband, therefore I can't celebrate his birthday. I have a boyfriend, but his birthday is in March and I simply can't wait that long... So instead I am going to have a birthday party for Spring! Therefore the party (weather being co-operative) will be held the 1st weekend in September.

Although I was inspired by the South West to host this party, particularly Bridgetown, I will host the party on my parents country property in York, Western Australia, which is only roughly a one-hour drive east of Perth, rather than the 255km trip to Bridgetown. This will, I hope, make it easier for my invited guests to make a round day trip, or if they so desire, can stay overnight at my parents 5 bedroom country house (pleeeeeeeese mum and dad can I have the keys?) (note to self: secure venue) and also there is a FABULOUS location in Bridgetown for one of the other parties, so if your going to make your guests travel, why make them travel to the same place twice?

Anyhow back to gumboots. And vintage glassware and china...Looks like I have some shopping to do, I'll keep you posted!

Photos, More Photos!

That's a Wrap!

Finally, as promised, a quick re-view of my first party - Cloud 9. Also are a few ;-) more pictures taken by MY official photographers... my awesome brother and his fabulous wife.

Overall I would have to say I am pretty damn proud of myself for the way this party turned out. My best successes are:
- Finding all the necessary decorations, serving ware and equipment. (It takes time, it took me at least 4 months, numerous hours on ebay, trawling second hand shops, asking friends to borrow things, and going to every swap meet, garage sale and flea market this side of Mars!)
- The pavlova for the Eton Mess and the dessert as a whole.
- Budgeting - I think I was quite creative in finding and using materials that were cost effective and re-usable.

On the flip side are the things I would improve upon if I was ever crazy enough to do the same party again:
- Setting up time. I allowed a whole day to do a quick clean of the house, decorate the lounge room, and cook the roast, apples and pumpkin. I had already cooked the truffles, dessert and mousse the day before. And when I say a full day, I mean a full day, I got up a little after six and my guests were not arriving until 7pm, so altogether, 13hours. However, as I mentioned in an earlier post, time still managed to get away from me and not all elements were completed. Very few of the stars got put on the wall, and the white painted clouds didn't get done. I would allow one day for the decorating and set-up alone, with 2 people.
- Cooking - I didn't do a dry run of the roasts first (as I was not sure who to feed all the pork to!) but in hindsight, I should have. It would have meant less smoke alarms going off, and not so starving guests.

So here are the final costs:
Plates: Average cost of a plate $1, number of plates - 20, total $20
Dessert bowls: Average cost $2, number of bowls - 20, total $40
Side plates: Average cost $1, number of plates 30 (extra for decorations) total $30
Swans: Total cost for 15ish swans $230
Gold candles: Number of candles, 9, total cost, $35
Serving plates and trays: Total cost $35
Gold Cutlery Set $150
Fabric for both sets of chair covers $150
Angel wings $120
Food: $200 (including $90 worth of meat)
Alcohol: $100
Invitations: $40
Carnations: $45
Cd's: $60
Stuffing: $60 (plus a lot more I had for free)
Black tablecloth satin: $35
Misc (blu tac, heart shaped tin, white napkins, star paper etc) $50


So, total cost of party? = Expensive!

But at the end of the day (or night as it was) it was most definitely worth it, I had a fabulous time researching, organizing, planning and hosting the party. I had a wonderful night with brilliant friends and family and I have my own happy memories to keep from that night. So now that the party is just a memory, my lounge room back to normal and my ebay account now idle, I find myself thinking...which one next? ;-)

Party Time!

Ok, I think I have teased you all long enough, lets get to the actual party time! I think last time I left off my blog bearley 5 minutes before guests arrived and just ready....

Set Scene: Doorbell rings, moments of heart palpitations and light sweat from hostess....Compose one's self with a swig of Kir Royal and open door, cue smile.

All of Gavin's and my guests arrived quite quickly (except 2) and drinks of Kir Royal were quickly in hand, yes, I did share the alcohol....and we mingled around the very small entry area, as my lounge room had been converted into a floating style restaurant. I passed around the salmon mousse and croutons, unfortunately the croutons were not as toasted as I would have liked, and instead were more like stale bread rounds, oh well. People were however suitably impressed by the decor, if not calling me just a little crazy for 'pizazz' factor of the decorations and layout of the dining area. 

It soon became apparent that unless we were about to start a game of sardines, that it would be better for all guests to be seated in the dining area, to give them more comfort. Once people were comfortably seated I went into the kitchen to check on how the entree was heating up. Almost done, I layed out the entree bowls, served another round of drinks, and as they would say on Masterchef, plated up. It took 2 people 3 trips to the kitchen to get all the bowls to the dining table, but yum! The entree was (I think) yummy. (I can say this because I just mearly copied a fabulous recipe in a book).

Conversation was thankfully flowing fine, so I set off back across the hall to check on main. Big problem number one. All dishes required did not fit in my oven as I had predicted. No matter, I solved the problem by placing one tray of pumpkin into a steamer and cooked one lot that one. Big problem number 2, more than 40mins later the pork was nowhere near done. No matter, just ply said guests with more alcohol. That done I went to check on the pork again. Still quite rare I put plan B into action. With Gavin's help we removed the 2 and a half racks from the oven, sliced them into cutlets and set about searing them in our two large frying pans. Problem number 3, the smoke alarms went off...twice. Thanks to my brother Justin who worked out how to hush them... By now I had worked up a minor panic, as guests had arrived at 7pm and has so far only eaten a small amount of salmon mousse and a small entree. And I had been giving out a lot of alcohol. Deciding between making my guests wait a little longer or give them food poisoning, I choose the first option and main was served a little before 9. Everyone loved the pork (Phew), and the brussle sprout and pancetta salad was yum. The pumpkin could have been cooked a little more evenly but overall I thought it was passable.

After dinner has settled a little while and conversation was still flowing nicely I went to finish plating up my favourite course for the evening, Eton Mess. mmmm Eton Mess. This was by far the easiest course to prepare and serve (except the chocolate truffles) but I am biased, I do love to cook and eat dessert and sweet things! Unfortunately once I had divided up all the desserts I realized that due to 2 bowls being broken in storage I realized I was 2 desserts short. Feeling my heart break just a little, I bravely faced up to the fact that I would have to sacrifice Gavin's and my desserts so all my guests would have one. But, to my fabulous surprise, Rav, one of my fabulous guests, informed me she could not eat egg. Shame, oh well dessert for me, her partner then announced he was not really a sweets fan and passed it bowl to Gavin. This course of the meal sounded like this. Nom Nom Nom Nom.

Next was coffee and chocolate truffles of which a person who shall remain nameless took two (Yes you Philip), and more wine, beer and Kir Royal. The evening began to wind to an end, and guests departed between 11pm and 2am. Gavin and I dragged ourselves to bed to face the cleanup in the morning...

T minus 12 hours

Imagine, its the night before the party. Due to the fact the chair covers took so long to make, I still have to buy all the groceries, make the chocolate minted truffles, cook the salmon mousse, collect 6 chairs from my brother and sister-in-laws and get some sleep. I was also supposed to attend the disco run by the P&C that night, but in my state of full party prep, I declined my invitation. Almost straight after school finished that afternoon I left school, drove to the shops, did the quickest grocery shop in the history of grocery shopping and worked on the chair covers. At 8pm I took a break to get the chairs, came home finished the chair covers and then cooked the salmon mousse, meringue and chocolate minted truffles. Not my best work, but it was edible.  By this stage I dragged my body upstairs and fell into bed.
   
Ok its the morning of the party - 7am. I am lying wide awake in bed with sheer panic running through my veins:

List of things to do:
- Collect 4 chairs, a CD player, baking trays, 2 trestle tables and Pyrex dishes from my parents.
- by a gazillion carnations
- buy the bottle of creme de cassis for Kir Royal drinks (after calling about 20 bottle shops in Perth the only place I could find it was De Vine Cellars in Inglewood).
- collect meat from my wonderful local butchers (Wharf st Quality Meats)
- set up the lounge room including covering the walls with black paper.
- clear all the furniture out of the lounge room in order to make room for the party furniture
- Make the entree, main and whip the cream and make the raspberry sauce for dessert.

You know, just the usual Saturday ;-)

To cut a long and boring story short I did manage to get everything done, but only with the help of my wonderful friend Nancy who helped my wallpaper my lounge room walls, by best friend Lisa that helped dress the chairs, put the candles in the vases and is my number one cloud maker, and her fiance Russell and my boyfriend Gavin who covered my windows with black plastic, put the stars up on the walls arranged the flowers in the swan and whipped the cream. So with just 5 mins before guests arrived, I was ready.

You bought how much Tulle?!

So the swan was fixed(ish), the local second hand shops were relieved of every gold edged plate and bowl I could find, I had trawled the local flea markets in search of glassware and further swans and I had even managed to buy 20 pairs of angel wings from Rave (probably due to all those fallen angles from the LYNX ads...Anyway, I digress. My next big problem was the chair covers. The ones in the book are dual layered, first a layer of champagne or pinkish satin/silk, covered over by a layer of tulle. I had previously looked at hire places for the chair covers, but at $20 a chair cover, times the number I needed = a lot. After much pondering and wishing I was a multi-millionaire, I remembered that a few weeks previously, myself and my boyfriend had attended an engagement party for one of his friends, and that the table cloths at the party were pretty much the colour required, made of the right fabric, and best of all, the brides mother had made the tablecloths, so hopefully I would be able to borrow them. Thankfully the lovely Amanda allowed me to borrow the tablecloths, and draped over the chairs they looked great, BUT, unfortunately there were only 9 tablecloths, and by that stage my guest list was 20 awesome friends. There was only one thing for it, it starts with Spot, and ends in light. So there I was one day after work during a Spotlight sale buying 40m of tulle, yes that's right - 2m per chair, times 20 chairs = 40m. Let me just say, I know, that is a friggin' lot of tulle. Add to that the 15m of Winston satin I bought for the remaining chair covers and I was starting to feel like perhaps spotlight ought to give me frequent flyer points, or at least a free thimble...At that point I brought all the fabric home, put it into the sewing room and shut the door for the magic sewing fairy to do her thing. Unfortunately, when I opened the door the weekend before the party, the magic sewing fairy had not done her job. Hmmm. So I pulled out the two massive rolls of tulle and set about cutting out the backs and fronts of the chair covers. I cut, sewed and pricked myself with pins for 3 days straight (thank god for long weekends) and by the end of it I was still only halfway through! I even had to laugh when I opened the door to the sewing room and it looked like a giant ball of cream fairy floss had swallowed my furniture, I was even dreaming about counting pins. But I knuckled down, came home from work every day as early as I could, and sewed like a mad-woman. By 9pm the night before the party, the chairs had clothes. Thank god!