Our Campervan Farewell/Birthday Party

Over the weekend we had the most epic party I think we have ever had.  Which is pretty crazy because we usually have pretty intense parties.  But we had to go big AND go home because we were celebrating not only the fact that we are leaving in a mere 34 days but also all three of our kids birthdays.  In fact, if we didn’t celebrate their birthdays with their friends I’m pretty sure they wouldn’t get into the van to leave.

But I’m cool with that.  I love a good party.  Literally any excuse to celebrate and I am THERE.  All in.  Invested.

For this party we went with a campervan theme.  Why?  Well, um, because…  Well we’re about to live in one for a year.  It also tied in nicely with the going away part of the party.  The original idea of meshing a spy, mermaid and ninja party just didn’t fit so lekker.

We had the party in our home because like I said in this post, it’s a way for us to keep the budget in check.  And boy did we need to keep our budget on a tight leash this year.  I mean aside from the fact that our financial sitch is about to change dramatically in a month, we were also catering for like, double the amount of people we usually do.

The party basically started from 2.30 till 4.30 with the kids school friends joining us, then from 4.30 our family and friends joined us for round two.  So we had the usual party food for the first half and then ordered curries from an amazingly gifted curry maker for supper for the second half.  (You need to get her details from me if you are looking for catering in Cape Town – you won’t be sorry!  I totally didn’t take a picture of it though.  I just totally forgot and things were a bit manic.)

As usual we made our own cake.

It’s our tradition and we take it very seriously.  Well as seriously as we can till it starts to become a pinterest fail and we just make the most of a bad situation.  Like last year I didn’t even bother making the cake myself.  There just wasn’t time and I didn’t need the added pressure of it potentially flopping (like the rainbow cake that almost made the children drunk).

So aside from buying the cakes at Woolies, rolling out fondant and providing moral support, I really can’t take any credit for how well the cake turned out.  Seth is just so much better at making it actually look like what it’s supposed to.  It’s that Architect brain of his.

But the cake looks AWESOME!

Our Optimus cake that we made for the party yesterday. And by we, I mean Seth pic.twitter.com/kR1Tm23qsc

— Cindy Alfino (@CindyAlfino) May 27, 2018

Guys, there were SO many people.  I think over the course of the day we had over 100 people come through and chill as our housie.  And we don’t really have a big house, so it was JAM packed.

I didn’t even bother with party packs (there’s enough food at the party yo and why do we even create this expectation that you get a gift for coming to a party anyway?) and I didn’t plan any games.  It was literally a free for all.  Which is probably why my house still looks like we had one of those hectic house parties.  Children are basically like drunk adults anyway right?

Here’s a small idea of how many people were there.

Crowded bro.  And that wasn’t even half of them.

But that’s exactly what we wanted and planned for.  We were excited to have all (well, most) of our friends and family there to chill and catch up with us.

The kids had the very best time and I think that they are satisfied that we celebrated them sufficiently before we head off.

I don’t really like posting pictures of other peoples kids so I have kept the party pictures to a minimum.  Only because I don’t want any angry parents shouting at me.

We had such a great time and I’m actually quite sad that we won’t be doing anymore of these for a year.  I love parties so much.

Another fun thing is that we had the camper open to everyone so we could show them how far we are (not very far at all) and give them an idea of what it’s really like inside.  It was quite a thing answering all the questions and taking everyone through the interior of the camper and our ideas.  Made it so much more real.  Which is good because with only 34 days left it’s about to get hella real.