Inside Olympian Sam Quek’s huge jungle Christening: ‘It was like a second wedding’

When guests arrived at the four-in-one celebration thrown by Sam Quek for her two children, they might have assumed the jungle theme was a nod to her 2016 stint on I’m a Celebrity. With a backdrop of lush foliage, a zoo-full of model animals and a stunning five tier cake complete with waterfall, the joint Christening and birthday party for three-year-old Molly and Zac, two, had unmistakable notes of the tropics. In fact the decor, created inside a hotel in Merseyside as a scene-setter to a day full of love and laughter, was inspired by the children themselves.

“They both love everything to do with the zoo and animals. I had a vision of what it would look like but it exceeded all my expectations,” said Sam, 35, as she chatted to OK! from the kitchen of her home in Wirral. “Molly and Zac absolutely loved it - even though we struggled to get a model of Zac’s favourite animal - a lion - so we made do with a couple of zebras instead!” she laughed.

“We had about 150 there in the end - it was like a second wedding - but we decided to either go big or go home and it was brilliant.” The day itself was conceived by Sam and husband Tom Mairs as a joint celebration to mark both the Christenings of their son and daughter and the children’s birthdays which fall only twelve months and one week apart. Both were Covid babies so there had been little opportunity for big get-togethers to mark their arrival until now. But, the couple explained, it was so much more than a party.