Charlie's First Birthday Party

Hi All,

I'm Thanh (Charlie's mum) and I thought I would begin what will hopefully be the start of a long line of fun, insightful and interesting blogs with an account of Charlie’s first birthday party and the preparation that went into planning this special occasion. Like, any mother who has a child with allergies/intolerances I was absolutely exhausted in the run up to Charlie’s first birthday. Not only had I not slept for a period longer than 3 hours, I was back at work four days a week and balancing this with having two children! However, after everything that our family had been through in the last year there was no way I was not going to have a birthday party for Charlie Bear.

When I had Summer (my first child) I really embraced occasions like birthdays. I was the mum who went all out, hiring out the local soft play centre for my child and all of her friends, spending a fortune on children’s entertainers, heck I hired a bouncy castle for the kids on my own birthday. What I came to realise as Charlie’s first birthday drew nearer and nearer was that, unfortunately, if I wanted C-Bear’s birthday to be as safe and inclusive for him as possible I could no longer just throw money at the situation and hire help/catering I would have to plan and throw the party myself!

I decided this was going to take some effort and so I booked the day of his birthday off and began to think of what I could do for Charlie in the weeks leading up to it. First of all, I had only just gone back to work so, after 5 months of statutory maternity pay and 2 months of no pay I didn’t have hundreds of pounds to spend on a children’s entertainer, so I really had to think outside of the box. Charlie’s birthday was on a Wednesday and the local community centre run’s a 45 minute baby singing group called Bongo Bongo on a Wednesday at 11am so I decided to hire the same room for two hours directly after the session finishes and invite all of our guests to join us for Bongo Bongo and a birthday lunch to follow.

With the entertainment sorted it was now just a matter of sorting out the menu. Now I say ‘just’ but as a mother of a child with an intolerance/allergy you know that this isn’t exactly the easiest task. Since there were going to be more non-allergic children than allergic I wanted to make sure that the party food was as inclusive for Charlie (with his Cow’s Milk Protein/Soya Intolerance) and Zach’s multiple allergies without feeling like I was presenting the non-allergic children with every piece of ‘fun’ food from the local health food shop! So, armed with my mobile phone (to ring Charlotte in case I was unsure) and a trip to ASDA after the kids were in bed I trawled the ‘free from’ aisles and came up with the following menu:

Soya free pittas - spread with ‘Pure’ Sunflower spread

Ham slices

Chicken breast slices

Hummus

Carrot sticks

Cucumber sticks

Cherry tomatoes

A variety of Organix crisps

Muller Little Stars Jellies

Egg and Dairy free Chocolate and Vanilla Sponge (Bought from a local vegan bakery)

The party bags even included ‘dairy-free’ chocolate buttons.

The fact that I was preparing the food at the community centre meant that I had to bring my own utensils to avoid cross contamination but it was not as difficult as I thought it was going to be. The fact that I managed to hire the hall that Bongo Bongo was being held at meant that I didn’t have to worry about providing my own entertainer. I also had a word with the founder of Bongo Bongo prior to booking the room so she made sure that ‘Bongo Ben’ made a fuss of Charlie on the day too and they lent us their play mats too. The hall was also really spacious and the kids were able to run around on their scooters and just generally have a good time!

All the mums also commented on how fantastic the birthday cake was too and didn’t even realise it was dairy and egg free!

So there you have it. With just a little thinking outside the box and forward planning I was able to pull off an allergy-free party for Charlie and Zach without costing me a fortune or compromising on fun and taste!

Until next time…

Thanh x