My oldest girl is turning five in a few months and I am starting to think of ideas for her upcoming birthday party. I have asked her what kind of party she wants to host and initially she resorted to “Princess” or “Barbie” which I am SO weary of and I don’t feel like feeding the Your Worth Rests In Your Beauty machine that our young girls are consumed by. So, I tried dropping other ideas and possibilities to see if she’d be open to a more unique theme and she started to get excited.
How about a garden party? We could serve worms ‘n’ dirt as a snack and send potted seeds home as favours?
Or a “mini” party where everything is little, like tiny cakes and tiny drinks and tiny food?
Or a rainbow party where the cake has, like, six different coloured layers and all the games and food is, I don’t know, rainbow-y?
She thought these were all great ideas, and now I guess I just have to pick one and run with it. Normally I don’t go all-out for kids’ parties. I like the cake to be unique and memorable, but aside from that I just dump a few bags of pretzels in bowls and let the kids play outside. Maybe a pinata, if they’re lucky. But this year, since I will be taking the summer off before I head back to work, I’d like to make her party a little extra special. She’s at an age where she will start to remember these things and I feel like turning five is a real milestone.
Have you hosted any amazing kids’ parties in your lifetime? What are some of the best (and worst) themes you’ve heard of? And what kind of budget do you try to stick to? I don’t want to spend more than $50-75 on everything (including goodie bags, decorations, invitations, etc) so what are some good tips for cutting costs without looking like a ghetto mom? Do any of you know that mom who goes way overboard and spends a thousand bucks on her two year-old’s birthday? What’s the most ridiculous thing you’ve heard of when it comes to kids’ parties?
I have a friend that have done some really cute parties. One was an eye-spy party, and the invitations were eye-spy pictures of all of her son’s favorite things (and had a story behind it all). They did a scavenger hunt and collected various games that had to do with the I Spy books.
She also did an art party for her daughter’s 5th birthday. They did decorate your own cupcakes. They had aprons with everyone’s names on them (dollar store and iron ons), then set up a studio with canvases and paint in the basement. While the kids were playing and eating, they set up all the art like an art show (with names and descriptions) and the kids were able to show their parents their art before taking it home.
My girl’s birthdays are in the summer, so we always turn our backyard into a water park with lots of sprinklers and a giant slip and slide (heavy duty tarp, Mr. Bubble, Hose…voila!). I’ve done it paired with and make your own ice cream bar (I found cute ice cream dishes at the dollar store for them to take home), as well as finger foods.
Also, my sister in law just had her daughter’s birthday at her dance studio, and the little girls all got a little dance lesson before their snacks etc…
I do theme parties every year at mine – I tie in the cake, do a couple of activities, put together a craft for them, and give them some time to play.
The year we did the princess theme, we avoided Disney all together and did pin-the-kiss on the frog, and jeweled ourselves some foil tiaras.
The year we did the beach party, we did the limbo, had magnetic fishing, decorated treasure chest with seashells and pearls, and ate “sand” cake with blue jello for water as well as fish sticks.
This year we did a science party with experiments, which was lots of fun.
I’d suggest a craft as a great way to use some time – and what they make can be their take-home, so I put a bit of money into making it something fun and a little nicer.
Decorating their own cupcakes can be fun, too.
I’ve seen a couple cute parties – one was a birthday tea party, where the girls all wore their prettiest dresses, and drank koolaid out of teapots & teacups with saucers, they also had trays of “dainty” snacks like mini cupcakes and tiny sandwiches. You could even make it “Alice-in-wonderland” style where everything says “eat me” “drink me” etc.
I’ve also seen a fairy party, which was super cute. The kids all had fairy wings and magic wands and the girls had tutus. They ran around the yard blowing bubbles for half the time.
The photo fantastic party Ashley suggested is seriously one of the cutest ideas I have ever heard of for a kids party!!
I say you make it a Photo fantastic party. Your girls love dressing up and they have wicked awesome senses of humour (who knows where that came from….eh? :)) I say you get a ton of fun dress up clothes from the thrift store and Value Village etc, set up a back drop or let them have at ‘er and then get one of your amazing buddies who takes super fantastic pictures (Hi Angella!) and get her to snap away. Some posed some not. Then print the pictures at Coscto (because they are cheap) and put them into neat scrapbooks/photo albums to send a few days later. The scrapbooks can be inexpensive at the dollar store and the girls will love having those memories. As a “Goodie Bag” (which we aren’t huge fans of either. Last year I made chocolate covered pretzels and they were a hit) get the inexpensive disposable cameras for each kid. Then they can take their own pictures.
Just a thought and something totally different for them 🙂
http://lifefrosting.blogspot.com/2010/12/invitation-elles-makeup-party.html
This sounded like a really great party, but she did one for her son that also sounded fantastic. She’s really inspiring.
For my little sisters 5th birthday last year my mom hosted a fairy party. It lasted about an hour and by the end the girls all became fairies. They had a scavenger hunt to earn their wings and played other games outside to earn their crowns and wands (all bought from the dollar store). After the games were done they ate cake (fairy shaped of course) and had snacks. Then it was time to be picked up. As the girls left with their fairy bits and bobs instead of a goodie bag my sister sprinkled them with “fairy dust” (sparkles) to complete the fairy transformation. It was cute, short, cheap and kept the kids entertained.
I LOVED planning my birthday parties, my Mum wouldn’t let me start till after Christmas (my birthday is Feb 15th) because it is all I could think about. Some of my fave parties were….one year I had a teddy bears picnic party, everyone had to bring their teddy bear and dress it up as something for a teddy bear costume contest and everything was teddy bears. I had an Aladin party when the movie came out, every one was dressed as Aladin characters, the games were all Aladin themed, I sat on a magic carpet as everyone entered and had a Genie cake. For Isabelle’s first birthday we did a polka dot theme so everything was polka dot, everyone had to wear polka dots (or stick dots on their clothes) the food was all round and arranged like polka dots. There are some really great websites where people share their ideas like http://www.birthdaypartyideas.com just don’t go giving all us other Mom’s too much to live up to 🙂
I am so not a fancy party planner. The kids at that age would rather play than be corralled into games and such. This year for Brooklyn’s 7th the kids decorated goodie bags and then had a scavenger hunt in the yard for the goodies. One to two hours, midday means not having to supply everyone a meal, chips, juice, cake, presents DONE! I do envy though the moms who have beautiful fancy parties, but that just isn’t me. Plus, I am not an invite the whole class kinda planner either. Good Luck!!
My most memorable birthday party… I was allowed to choose one friend and we went on a surprise “scavenger hunt”. I thought we were just going to Chuck-e-Cheese to play games, but when I went to turn in my tickets, the girl behind the counter gave me a present to open… the present had clues about the next place we were going. We ended up going to the mall to pick out a new little pair of earrings… out to my favorite restaurant for dinner.. to Blockbuster to rent a movie.. to Dairy Queen to pick out my ice cream cake for dessert… etc, etc. At each place, a worker at the store would give me another clue for the next stop that my mom snuck them while I was shopping.
Simple, inexpensive, but creative and so much fun. Definitely my most memorable childhood birthday… focused on all of my favorite little things at the time!
I love the garden party idea. The girls could wear little dresses (perhaps) and have tea, and love the worms in dirt idea!!
My friend did a rainbow party for her daughter and asked all the kids to come dressed “in their favorite color of the rainbow”. It was cute and colorful and fairly simple. I think she even found a rainbow-shaped pre-made pinata.
My favorites for my girls have been the “tea party” we had– had the kids come dressed in their “fanciest” clothes (their own choice, the moms and I decided ahead of time, so it was funny and cute to see what they thought was “fancy”), and had them bring a stuffed friend to have tea with. We put out little tea sets all over and play food and they played tea party. We also played a version of musical chairs where they passed a fancy purse and when the music stopped, they could open it and pick a fancy prize. There was no mention of princess or barbie. Also, I wanted to do this all outside in “garden party” fashion, but it was cold that day. We served “tea” (pink lemonade in tea cups) and little tea sandwiches and tiny “tea cookies”.
My other favorite is the breakfast party we had. My daughter invited her pals over at 9 am in their pj’s and we served hot chocolate and donuts (and had fun toppings for the hot chocolate). They also did melting beads (my daughter’s favorite at the time) and then watched a cartoon, “Saturday morning” style. It was so simple and easy. And CHEAP. Sure the kids were fairly sugared up, but not any more than any other birthday party.
I love the rainbow party!!! Instead of goodie bags, do an activity like everyone tie dyes a t-shirt/banner to take home. I’m all about a craft as opposed to a plastic bag of plastic crap (that I end up tossing within days).
We are not ‘party throwers’ so the expense some families go to just amazes me. Stick to simple and small–she’ll remember her party, don’t worry.
We did the rainbow themed party for Micah last year. Even made that cake (with much help from a friend) that you linked to. I made paper pinwheels and attached them to those gigantic pencils as the favors (the kids loved them) all in rainbow colors. Then we did some of those clear painting things that hang in the window (can’t remember what they’re called exactly) cause you know, they make a rainbow when the sun shines on it. It was the first year I did cakes/themed parties for my kids and am looking for ideas for my kids this year too. go rainbows! However I think the tiny idea is fun;)
I have thrown very few “parties”. My kids tend to go for the few friends to dinner or movie or sleepover thing. Those bigger parties have all been at a party place and cost a small fortune. But it is stress free for me!
Btw, if you do ANY of these parties please post pictures. You will be my hero.
My sister is doing a ‘neon’ party for my niece – so they’re painting their finger nails neon and have a tshirt to make with neon paints. So that is the goody bags. Then they are going glow in the dark bowling. I thought it was cute!
i’m giving up on goodie bags. that just feeds the “dump monster”. i’m more of a make your own thing and take it home with you kind of girl. might be doing my oldest’s at “michael’s” next year…looks within my budget of about $10 a kid!
i am flabbergasted by the million dollar parties thrown for a one year old but in the same breath they are chiding me for taking my 4 year old to disneyworld because that’s too young for them to remember…sheesh….