Hello! We've moved.

Hi, everyone! The Crackers Art blog now has a new home over at my revamped website - www.crackersart.com.au. This blog will no longer be updated, so please join me over there to find out all about the parties and printable ranges I'm creating.

The Crackers Art printables shop is still at the same address - www.etsy.com/shop/crackersart.

See you over there!

Wonka Party Printables Range now available!

This is hardly news since I've been selling these Willy Wonka printables since April, but I've been remiss in actually showing what's available here on my blog.

Behold...the full range of Wonka party printables now available in my Etsy shop, including the coveted backdrop!

Soccer Party Printables Range now available!

I have just uploaded my new Soccer Party Printables Range to my Etsy shop.

Here they are!

Hugo's 7th Birthday - Willy Wonka Inspired Theme

Well, what a month it's been! After completing Harvey's Lego Birthday Party, I jumped straight into planning Hugo's 7th birthday party around the theme of Willy Wonka. We'd recently finished reading Charlie And The Chocolate Factory together, and Hugo's head was full of golden tickets, chocolate waterfalls, and strange little singing oompa loompas.

Of course, I knew I had to share the original 1971 movie with him, and when Mr Wonka invited his guests into the edible garden at the heart of the factory, the look on Hugo's face was exactly how I felt when I watched it as a child - you just really, REALLY wanna be one of those kids gorging themselves on edible toadstools and lollipop flowers! I knew I had to try and recreate the magic of the chocolate factory for Hugo somehow for his 7th birthday party.

I'm all about the original 1971 Wonka movie, with its awesome retro aesthetic and the brilliance (brilliance, I tells ya!) of Gene Wilder. There is so much to love about the book, and even more to love about how it was adapted the screen. There was no question for me that I wanted to emulate the look and feel of the characters and props from that movie.

So, here it is! I hope you enjoy looking at the pictures as much as I enjoyed creating it all (click on any of the images if you want to see them a bit larger).

Come with me and you'll be in a world of pure imagination...

Here's the invitation that went out to all the kids. Nearly all of them turned up on the doorstep clutching their tickets for entry....so cute!

The dessert buffet table

I completely winged it making these little toadstools after grabbing a bunch of ingredients off the supermarket shelf and toying with a general idea of what I wanted to achieve. At one point during the assembly of them, it looked like they might be a total disaster! But instead, they turned out to be a big hit at the party! Yummo!

 Once again, I had the birthday cake made by the very talented Lisa from Cakes & Biscuits By Lisa. I based the design on a large Wonka Chocolate Bar (to match the invitations), and Lisa executed it perfectly in fondant icing over a delicious chocolate mud cake. It tasted divine and looked fantastic!

Designing these cupcake toppers had me giggling like a lunatic very late one night...

My home-made cookie pops!

What's a chocolate factory without chocolate bars!

This is the snack table the kids indulged in before a sit-down lunch of hot food and fruit platters. As you can see, it's a bit of a shrine to the one-and-only fabulous Mr Willy Wonka!

 What do you do with the leftover melted chocolate from making marshmallow toadstools? Rummage around for some plastic spoons and make chocolate spoonfuls! Waste not want not!

Everlasting gobstopper bunting!

  It's Hugo Wonka the birthday boy! I found Hugo's hat in a bargain store and painted it red (was originally pink) and I found the retro jacket in an op shop. It was originally white, so I popped it in a bucket with some purple dye and Wonka's your uncle! Hugo didn't take it off all day.

Some fun from our Wonka Photo Booth.

At the end of the party, one very happy little birthday boy and one very tired purple-haired mummy.

And there you have it! Our very own Wonka Chocolate Factory. :o)

Party Credits:

Party Styling and Food: Crackers Art

Wonka Cake: Cakes & Biscuits By Lisa

Party prop design: Crackers Art

Buffet table backdrop printing: Purplex Design & Print

Party Invitations and Printables: Crackers Art

Photography: Crackers Art

Building Block Party Printables NOW AVAILABLE!

So happy to announce my building block party printable range is now available for purchase through my Etsy store. Head on over and take a look!

Harvey's 5th Birthday - Lego Inspired Theme

Well, after a month of planning and lots of late nights, everything fell into place for my son Harvey's 5th birthday party on Saturday. The theme was Lego and the emphasis was on colour (and lots of it!)

I had an absolute ball with this theme, and enjoyed creating a whole range of party printable items which will be available soon in my Etsy shop. I usually have a crack at the cake and biscuits myself, but this time around I enlisted the skills of the awesomely-talented Lisa from Cakes & Biscuits By Lisa.

It all started with this invitation design...

 ...and from there I started creating graphics to use on everything from buffet labels to lolly bags. 

Here's the dessert table, with personalised Lego man bunting in the background...

And here is the awesomely-brilliant cake by Lisa at Cakes & Biscuits By Lisa. Lisa was able to capture EXACTLY what I wanted and used her clever hands and oodles of creative talent to come up with the centrepiece for this quirky and colourful party!

Check out the orange construction cone candles - aren't they fabulous? Such a great idea Lisa!

And a special shout-out has to go to my almost-7-year-old Hugo who built the Lego vehicles for me for the cake. Saved mum a job and kept him occupied!

And now we move onto the snack table. This was the table I let the kids hit first, as it wasn't ALL sugar like the dessert table. They also had a sit-down lunch of savoury yummies before it was time for the desserts.

And what's a party without some games? As well as a 'Draw Your Own Lego Character' colouring competition, we also had a 'Pin The Brick In The Wall' game (our Lego version of Pin The Tail On The Donkey), free-range Lego on the lounge-room rug, and some Lego tower-building races. I created all the graphics for the games, which I just kept simple and effective.

So all-in-all, a super-fun party which Harvey and his friends thoroughly enjoyed. Here's an example of Harvey's excitement level when he saw the dessert table all set up...

And here he is after he'd calmed down a little...

And here we are having a quick cuddle just before it was cake-cutting time. We had to bid farewell to that gorgeous cake before we starting hacking it to bits! (sorry Lisa...hahaha).

So that was Harvey's Lego party! Now I need to turn my mind to Hugo's 7th birthday party in a month. So, time to get the creative cogs turning again...

Thanks for reading. :o)

Party Credits:
Party Styling and Food - Crackers Art

Party Printables - Crackers Art  (coming soon to my Etsy shop)

Lego Birthday Cake - Cakes & Biscuits By Lisa

Lego Biscuits - Cakes & Biscuits By Lisa

Photography - Crackers Art