Oriental Yum Cha Party!

This weekend's winning party feature goes to this ORIENTAL YUM CHA PARTY submitted by Ham and Pea. Li-Ann created this party for her twin boys...and did an amazing job! Where to even begin?! All the details scream perfection. I adore the dumpling cakes made by The Cake Collective. And check out the Skype booth that was created so long distant grandparents could be a part of the fun! 

You can purchase the printables for this party here. Bamboo cutlery, boats, cups and plates purchased from The Party Studio. 

Photography by Luanne and Steve.

Party details from Li-Ann:

We used a variation of shapes and sizes of red and white paper lanterns which we hung from the ceiling. We converted our dining table as the main food and dessert table and lined it with a khaki bed sheet (yes we did!) which was purchased from Target for about $15. I converted our IKEA timber bookshelf into a ‘goody shelf’ filled with treats, bamboo cutlery’s and take home favors. I purchased some super cute mini chinese lanterns during a recent trip to Malaysia and used that to decorate the party room (aka our dining room), the goody shelf and our ‘skype booth’. I also purchased gold old-style ‘money’  in various sizes to use as decoration for the main food table. Some were plastic and some were real chocolates (sorry for the confusion kids!)

I also made chopstick sleeves using the patterned sheets and have them ready as a printable file complete with instructions which you can purchase HERE. Easy peasy! Another DIY which I thought was quite clever was making money bags (wontons) out of kraft paper. We filled them with gold coin chocolates and tied with thick offwhite coloured twine.

We placed the party favors on the goody shelf as well. The packaged a variety of gold old-styled money and gold coins (all edible) in red organza bags with gold oriental prints. I made chinese scrolls in place of thank you tags attaching circular balsa wood to either ends of the note, rolling both ends together towards the middle and securing it with more twine. I used chinese characters where possible with english translation to really carry through that oriental flavour across the party.

When my parents told me how disappointed they will be to miss out on their grandsons first birthdays, I decided to create a ‘Skype Booth’ so that they could join in the party from overseas as well! That sure was a bit of fun! I decorated an old gold frame we had lying about the house with the red chinese lanterns and created a ‘Skype Booth’ scroll to go with it.

Some other details would be a little colouring section which we set out for the older children. I drew out 2 little dumpling men (supposedly Hamish & Luca) colouring sheet with the words “I LOVE DUMPLINGS” which kept the older children occupied whilst their mums and dad got to enjoy a bit more of real dumplings.

Lastly, I turned out laundry trolley into a gift basket trolley where guests could place their gifts in. What’s more fun is dressing the wheels of the trolley with the patterned sheet and turning cupcake holders inside out as a floral touch in the middle of the wheels.. Whee!

We catered for a variety of chinese dumplings and a variety of spring rolls whilst I made ‘san choy bao’ and ‘prosperity noodles’ for the guests to enjoy (well at least I hope it was enjoyable)

We had all kinds of chinese sweet treats! I wanted to cater for a true ‘Yum Cha’ gastronomic experience so decided not to have the usual suspects of delightful cupcakes and cookies but instead when hunting about Chinatown for some chinese treats. We had egg tarts in place of cupcakes and ‘mooncake’ / lotus bean cake in place of cookies. We also had all kinds of other sweet finger food such as sesame and coconut cookies, love letters, real fortune cookies and jackfruit and lychee cocktail.

We wanted them to have a cake each and had them custom designed to the invitation to look like bamboo steamers with different dumplings on each cake. I made miniature chinese lantern buntings with the boys’ names to attach to the cake. Cute!

Inspired to throw a party like this yourself? Purchase our Oriental Yum Cha printables HERE.

A special thanks to THE PARTY STUDIO for providing all our bamboo cutlery’s, boats, cups, plates.

Thank you to THE CAKE COLLECTIVE for bringing seeing my vision through- you clever lady.

Last but not least, a big thank you to my friends Luanne and Steve for the great photography!