Are you planning a FIFA World Cup party for Brazil 2014? #BigMatchPlanner

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Are you planning to celebrate the FIFAWorld Cup with your family and Friends?

The Summer seems to be finally here and this week marks the start of Brazil 2014, so why not get your whole family involved and throw a World Cup Party for the Big Match? It's the perfect way to get everyone together, football fanatics or not!

I love a party, delicious food, drink and lots opportunities to have a gossip with friends while we watch the children play together. One thing I don't always admit though is that one of my favourite parts of any party is actually the planning...

I'm a bit of a control freak, I love making lists, creating Pinterest boards and even putting together good old fashioned scrapbooks of ideas with magazine cuttings so I really am in my element when I have a party to plan!

When planning a Party there are a few things that I need to always consider before I lose myself in Pins, colour schemes and shaped sandwiches...

• Theme
• Guests
• Location
• Budget
• Food and Drink
• Entertainment

Theme

At first it seems like this is an easy one... Football of course! Then again there may be more to ponder. Would you set the theme as just football in general, or more specific to the FIFA World Cup? What about a Brazilian theme in honor of the host country? Or if your planning a party on the day of the big England game then you incorporate the traditions and food from both England and their opponent. A great way to represent this would be to decorate your party venue in colours to reflect the Flags of the countries playing.

Guests

One of the most most important things to think about when party planning is your guests. Are you inviting friends with young children, Will they need space to run around or somewhere to nap? Will they be fussy eaters? Do your guests have any dietary requirements?

Another thing to consider is whether you will be asking your guests to dress up? Or maybe just wear an item of clothing in a certain colour? How will you get them into the party spirit?

Location

Location, location, location... As they say! Now unless you're planning to hold your Big Game celebrations at a more exotic location, it's likely to be in your home. There are still factors to consider about your venue. If your guests have children are are there some areas that are off limits? Are the areas that they will have access to childproofed? Will you be dining outside? The weather is a major decider for this last question as it's not always something that you can plan in advance. It may be worth setting up a gezebo over the food tables just in case of showers even if the forcast is brilliant sunshine, as you can never be sure!

Budget

I am always considering how much I spend when shopping, whether that be for everyday groceries or something a bit different. So when party planning I set a budget. If it looks like your budget may be a little stretched then why not ask you guests to each contribute a dish. 

To make it fun and interesting why not write down the countries on scraps of paper and ask them to pick one 'lucky dip style? Then they can bring a dish inspired by that country.

So many aspects of a party can be done for not cost at all. If you don't want to splash out on decorations then get the children to make their own bunting or paperchains in world cup colours! It's simple to do and a great creative activity!

Food and Drink

Food and drink is a major part of any party. You need to cater for all but try not to over do it or you'll be eating left overs for the rest of the week! In warm weather a BBQ with a selection of salads can be the perfect party spread. Why not check out some of my favourite BBQ recipes...

Feta and Beetroot Salad 

Make your own Kebabs

Greek Salad

Why not incorporate your theme into your food? You could use the colours to create 'flag' kebabs, or even cut sandwiches and burgers into flag shapes! If you don't have time to be that creative there are plenty of ready theme snacks you can buy in the supermarket to complete your food table. Why not Make a Brazilian flag out of limited Edition M&M's or your younger guests football shaped BabyBel?

A party deserves some treats and one treat that always takes me back down memory lane to watching football with my Dad when I was a child is an ice cream coke float! Just pop a generous scoop of vanilla ice cream on top of a glass of coke and finish with a colourful straw!

So simple to make but a treat guaranteed to bring a smile to kids and big kids of all ages!

I often shop online but for a party shop I prefer to do it in person so I can meander around the aisles and seek inspiration from the store displays. I recently visited my local Tesco store in Prestwich to purchase some drinks and was pleased to get caught up in football fever. The store was decorated with flags and bunting and the staff were all easy to chat to you about the approaching England v Italy match. I headed over to the drinks aisle and was met with an array of brands that were displaying their support for the World Cup. The most prominent of these were the Coca Cola Displays

 

Entertainment

You can't have a party without entertainment especially for the children, so here are some easy ideas for party entertainment.

Facepainting

Why not invest in a small facepaints kit and get creative by painting World Cup country flags on your guests faces. Even better if you can get an artistic friend to volunteer themselves!

Penalty Shoot Out

If you have room in the garden (away from the BBQ of course!) why not have a penalty shoot out? A great way of burning of some calories from the food!

Play Family Football Bingo

Why not download this free Bingo card from the Tesco Living website and play?

Make your own Brazilian Carnival Headdress

Why not lay out some crayons and paints and let the children get creative? The are some great free templates to download here.

I hope I've been able to help you plan your FIFA World Cup Party, Why not check out #BigMatchPlanner on Twitter for further ideas from #CollectveBias?

Easter Baking - Hot Cross Buns #cbias

Although the weather is making it feel more like Christmas, believe or not Easter will be here in just a few days time. To make it feel a bit more like the Easter holidays I decided to do some baking. As you may know I have been trying to challenge myself with recipes recently, experimenting with things I've never tried before, so off I went to Aldi in search of the ingredients for a yummy Easter treat that I was going to bake myself....

                                                                   hot cross buns!

You can check out my shopping experience in this Google+ album...

Shopping for Easter baking Ingredients at Aldi

I love a nice toasted hot cross bun, warm and dripping with butter, it really is the perfect comfort food and what better to warm us all up in this nasty cold weather?

My 5 year old Ben is a really keen cook and usually helps me with baking but on this occasion I wanted to try it out myself first so I waited until the children were tucked up in bed then out came the ingredients...

Can you spot the error in this picture?!

I was really pleased with what I had got for my money in Aldi, as although I regularly visit for a top up shop of fruit, veg, bread and milk, it's not the first place I would have gone for home baking ingredients. Well now I know about the great selection and prices it will be in the future!

So I had my ingredients ready all I needed to do was start baking. After mixing the flour, salt, cinnamon and mixed spice together in a large bowl, I rubbed in the butter then added the currents, mixed peel and yeast.

I now had a dry lumpy mixture and created a well in the centre to add the water, milk and egg, (this is always Ben's favourite part of baking, adding eggs!)

After mixing in, I was ready to knead. There is something incredibly relaxing about kneading dough, maybe I am taking all my daily frustrations out on this fruity mixture, while I pound it against the floury surface, whatever it is, I find it really therapeutic!

Once it's fairly smooth and elastic I pop it back into the bowl and cover with a damp tea towel for an hour while I go off to watch Don't tell the Bride, it's my wedding anniversary this week and it all takes me back to the preparations for my big day, thank goodness I planned it and not my other half though, I'd have been wearing a bin bag if it was down to him!

After a  giggle and a brew it was back to the kitchen to find my dough had risen nicely, now to press the air out and knead again before dividing up into buns and leaving again for 30 minutes to continue to rise.

I have always wondered how the cross was made on the top of hot cross buns and now I knew, it was pastry! Rather than making my own pastry just for this, I had bought a pack of ready to roll with my earlier shopping, so I opening this up and started cutting it into strips, I barely glanced at the packaging.

It was soon time to pop the buns in the oven, so after brushing with beaten egg and placing the strips of pastry on top of each ball of dough in they went at 200c for 15 minutes.

It was only when I went to take them out of the oven that I noticed that something wasn't right, not wrong as such, they still looked (and smelt) delicious, but I was sure the cross wasn't meant to rise that much? It was only then that I glanced across to the packaging of the pastry to find I had bought Puff Pastry and not shortcrust! Silly me! (Did you notice my error in the photo?)

Oh well, they still tasted amazing (I had to try one straight away, just to make sure!) and I now know for next time, Although my hubby did say that he quite liked the crunchiness of the puff pastry so you never know I could be on to something!

Apart from my school girl error, these were a great success and I will be making them again with Ben's help very soon. Why not have a go and let me know what you think? 

Happy Easter!


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as part of a social shopper insights study for Collective Bias® #CBias #SocialFabric. All images and opinions are my own.