The Mum behind Party Mums

Hi I'm Kirsty, chief party mum and director here at Party Mums. I thought I would do something a little different today and take the time to introduce myself to you properly, let you know a little about me and talk to you about the story behind Party Mums and how it all started.

Sounds pretty straight forward, right? I'll let you in to a little secret. I'm freaking out over here!!

I could chat all day to you about the different themes and products I love and talk to you about all the different talented people I follow on instagram and how I love seeing and sharing their stories and success. But ask me to post anything personal about myself and it feels too big, scary even. Gulp!

But yesterday something changed. As I sent my eldest child off for her first day at high school, I was full of encouraging words like, go for it, try to enjoy it, do something amazing, just be you. All good advice I hear you say, but I thought to myself, you should do that, you should just go for it! Stop hiding behind your brand and products and really put yourself out there. So here we are, is this out there enough? Grab a cuppa or something stronger if you fancy, no judgements made here and let me fill you in.

I love all things party, the planning, researching trends, sourcing products, finding venues, everything down to the smallest detail. It's often the smallest of details that stops me getting my pile of ironing down, cleaning the bathroom, or getting round to sewing that button back on. I get great pleasure in helping others create the perfect party, precious memories that celebrate special moments and milestones in their life with family and friends. It's fantastic, amazing and a real buzz, I love it! But I was doing all of this as a hobby, for family and friends, I already had a job and I never thought that I could make my hobby a career.

At the age of 21 I landed myself a job with a fabulous airline, you know the one that dresses head to toe in red, Virgin Atlantic. How I managed to ace that interview I'll never know!! I had only ever travelled on a long haul flight once and that was 2 weeks prior to starting the job. With Virgin I was able to travel all over the world, places I never dreamt I would see and I met some of the funniest people around. You can have the craziest of conversations at 3am in the back kitchen of a jumbo jet I tell you, nothing is off limits. Nothing.

But there were also serious sides to the job too. I learnt many skills and we're not just talking tea and coffee here people. I learnt how to deal with inflight fires, decompressions, severe turbulence, heart attacks, hijackers, and much, much more. After all, when you are 36,000 feet in the air, in a metal tube, travelling over 500mph over the Atlantic ocean, there's nobody going to come and save you! I learnt to do all of this whilst trying to remain perfectly polished, with a smile on my face and my customers at the heart of everything I did. It was not always possible I can tell you that, but I learnt how to multitask pretty quick.

I also learnt the importance of attention to detail and how little touches here and there can really make a difference to how something looks and how it is received. The smallest of details, like when you serve your customers dinner in Upper Class, the tiny aeroplane logo on the plate should always be at the 12 o'clock position, the cutlery just so. The glass should be positioned in the same place each time you remove and refill the drink, which you should do without letting the bottle touch the rim of the glass and by twisting the bottle at the end of pouring the drink to avoid dribbles. Little touches, probably missed by most, but they were there and I liked them.

I found that I started to do this at home. I don't mean when I would have my evening meal, that would be a little too far, you would think I was crazy! But when I would have family gatherings, buffets etc, I would spend hours planning the layout of the tables and the place settings, making personal touches here and there and focusing on the overall display. I would try and create a colour scheme and bring different textures and decorations together. I think this was where my party roots really began, or it could have been just OCD.

When I would be enjoying down time in America after working the flight out there, I would spend hours in different department stores and shops browsing party supplies and ideas, hoping that there would be a celebration to plan for soon at home with family and friends, just so I could use some of the fantastic products I had found. They have it all out there, everything and they use party planners regularly to help them throw gorgeous parties you can drool over. I really wanted to be part of that.

I think my full on party head really kicked in though, after having children. I haven't told you about my family yet have I? I've been married to my husband for 15 years and counting. We've known each other a long time, lived in the same town all our lives and even went to the same primary school, we have photos to prove it. I know what you are thinking and no, that's a step too far to share those old photos with dodgy 80s haircuts, no. Moving on quickly. I think friends and family thought I might marry a pilot or meet someone whilst I was flying around the world, but home is where your heart is isn't it and it was a home boy for me.

We married in 2003, travelled as much as we could on holidays and also on my work trips, making the most of my cheap flight tickets through work. In 2007 we had our first child, a daughter, then in 2009 we welcomed our second child, or should I say children, boy and girl twins. Life certainly got busy. I will be honest with you here, there are periods in their first 2 years of life I cannot remember, photos I don't recall being there for and events that happened around the world that I have no recollection of!! True fact.

I went back to work after all 3 children, by which time my multi tasking skills had really gone up a level. Thank goodness for grandparents, there's no way we could have done anything without them. I worked long haul and then looked after the children full time when at home. As they started to grow and celebrate their birthdays my party juices started flowing again. This was great, always a celebration to plan for and each year it would get bigger and bigger and I would spend longer and longer selecting themes, decorations and party DIY ideas. It basically became all I would think about when I had free time and there wasn't loads of that. Pinterest was my bedtime reading and I would trawl through post after post of beautiful party ideas, pinning images of parties I would love to plan and create.

Family and friends started to ask me to help plan and create parties for them and parents of children who came to parties for my children, would ask if I had thought about offering my party planning skills as a service to others? Er no, was always my answer, I hadn't been to college or on any sort of event planning courses to qualify me to do that. However as time went on and the parties got bigger and better and my free time increased when the kids went to school, parties were still all I thought about. I just couldn't get enough. So with the help of my family, friends and my husband, my biggest supporter, I decided to give it a go.

Party Mums was created along side my flying career, something I could do whilst the kids were at school and at the weekend. It was all about helping others to throw 'the' party that they always wanted for themselves or a loved one and to create memories with family and friends that would last a long time. It started to be more than just a side line activity and I realised that when I was away flying all I could think about was getting back home to my family and Party Mums. I realised that my flying career was now my second passion, I needed to be home to concentrate fully on Party Mums, it was in my brain all the time. So after 20 years as a Flight Service Manager, I decided to hang up my wings and keep my feet firmly on the ground. If I wanted Party Mums to be everything it could be, I needed to be home full time.

Since being home based I now spend lots more time focusing on Party Mums. I've introduced Sleepover parties to the services on offer, which I love. Have you seen the latest theme Boho, it's gorgeous. I am constantly searching for new themes and trends and I have 3 great little soundboards to bounce off, the kids don't hesitate to tell me what's a hit and what's a flop. 

It's taken a whole lotta time and passion to get Party Mums to where it is now, it's been a family effort and I hope to be able to continue to provide gorgeous parties and celebrations for more people, that can reach the same level of wow as our friends across the pond. 

If you've stayed with me to the end, thank you, you're a real star. You now know a little more about me and my party obsession and my family, who I couldn't do this without. Drop me a comment and let me know if putting it out there was the way to go!

Well gotta go myself, you know that Halloween is fast approaching and I have a parties to plan!

Enjoy the rest of your week.

Kirsty

Living the high life.