Here’s a list of some companies that give away free products for you birthday. That’s right, free! All you need to do is register on their wesite and tell them when your birthday is. Baskin Robins – Free Scoop of ice cream. Ben and Jerrys – Free scoop of ice cream. Old Navy – $10 [...]
Arts and Crafts…..A sure winner for girls birthday parties!
When I asked my 5 year old daughter what she wanted to do for her birthday party, she gave it a lot of serious thought (one of life’s most important questions for a 5 year old.) Her answer? Arts and Crafts. I said to her that she does arts and crafts almost every day, in [...]
The Birthday Party How To
Welcome to The Birthday Party How To, the parents’ guide to making great and memorable birthday parties for your children. The goal of this website is quite simple: Provide information to parents about how to make a great birthday party for your child. As you explore the site you will realize that I will be [...]
Here’s a list of some companies that give away free products for you birthday. That’s right, free! All you need to do is register on their wesite and tell them when your birthday is.
Baskin Robins – Free Scoop of ice cream.
Ben and Jerrys – Free scoop of ice cream.
Old Navy – $10 coupon for purchase of $50 or more.
The post popular birthday party theme for young girls is always the Princess Party. Let’s face it, Disney has spent millions of dollars marketing their princesses, and the result is the closest thing to a cult like following among 3-6 year old girls (I have yet to meet the 5 year old boy who is obsessed with princes). When we were in Disney Land last year, I stood in line for more than an hour with my daughter so that she could have her picture taken with ‘Ariel.’
Just be careful that when you plan the princess party that there are no other girls in the class or on the invite list who are making a princess party the week or two before yours. The last thing you want is for all the girls to go home saying “Emily’s princess party last week was soooo much better.”
The Invitation
So how do you make a great princess party? Well, first it starts with a princess themed invitation. This is not too hard to do on your own, here’s a sample text to use: Hear Ye, Hear Ye. The most beautiful princess in all the land invites all creatures, big and small, young and old, to join her at a royal ball celebrating her 5th birthday. Wear your elegant gowns, bring your royal crowns (and if you don’t have one, that’s OK, we have one you can borrow) and join us for a most elegant party. Carriages may arrive at 2PM.
You want to make it really easy for yourself? You can download a princess party invitation PDF template that I made, and just type in the specific name/date/time info. Click here (right click, ‘save link as’) to download the file, all you need is Adobe Acrobat Reader or a similar pdf reader to use this template.
OK, so you have a great invitation and a really excited daughter, now what? Well, what makes a great Princess Party are the decorations. Consider the following:
Princess Party Decorations
Take an arm chair chair and turn it into the princess’s throne. Wrap it with a large bed sheet (silver, gold, pink or red if you have) and tie it with ribbons. Get a large pillow to use as a cushion, and consider tying some balloons to it as well.
Every princes has a court jester wearing loud color clothing. This is best for mom or dad, or maybe a sibling.
Dress the dog up like a dragon? Just a thought.
Set the royal table with elegant plates and cups (disposable of course)
Get some extra princess dresses for children who do not come wearing one. costumesupercenter is a great place for this.
Buy princess necklaces, bracelets, crowns and clip on earrings for all the children
And what are the activities, you may ask? Here are a few thoughts:
Princess Party Activities
A royal tea party (lemonade can also do the trick : ) )
Make up time, nail polish.
A royal dance – all the girls learn how to dance like elegant princesses, or perhaps a round of freeze dance.
A scavenger hunt to find the princess’ jewels.
The princess can open her presents while sitting on her royal thrown.
I know, I know, it’s the oldest game in the book (well, maybe second to pin the tail on the donkey), but kids really like it. Musical chairs is a fun activity for any birthday party – and any age. I’ve seen it work for 5 year olds, and I’ve seen it work for adults. People may laugh when they hear that’s the activity you’re going to do, but they’ll play, and they’ll have a blast.
For those of you from a foreign county, or who never had a childhood, here’s how to play:
Set up two rows of chair, back to back.
Ideally, if there are enough chairs, everyone starts off standing in front of a chair.
When you turn the music on (it can be any popular song) the kids walk around the chairs.
When you stop the music everyone needs to quickly sit down on a chair. the catch: every round you remove a chair so that there are not enough chairs for every person (so if there are 20 kids playing, only have 18 chairs).
Each round you remove 2 chairs, so that each round there are two children who are unable to find a chair to sit in.
The last round there should only be two children walking around one chair. When the music stops, the child who is sitting wins.
Variations can be that everyone needs to walk backwards, everyone needs to dance. everyone is blindfolded (be careful with this one).
Making birthday parties for your kids doesn’t have to be rocket science. Just figure out what they love doing and have them do it with their friends. A sports themed party is great for boys of all ages. Here’s a baseball one:
Send out a birthday party invitation that looks like a ticket to a baseball game.
Have all the kids come dressedup as their favorite baseball player.
Play a baseball game in your backyard or at a close by park. For the younger kids, play teeball or wiffleball.
You can rent a microphone and small amplifier for pretty cheap and then you or another parent can be the announcer.
For older kids, consider doing the whole party at battingcages.
Have the parents dress up as umpires.
Give out baseballcards and cracker jacks in the goody bag. (You can even order customized baseball hats or shirts for the party.)
Little kids love magic tricks! And the truth is, you don’t need to be a Harry Houdini to impress little kids. Before one birthday party, I spent a few hours on youtube learning how to do a variety of tricks. Nothing to fancy (or expensive) but the kids loved it!
When doing magic, equally as important as the trick itself is the performance and the theatrics. Buying a simple magic hat, cape and wand can make the simplest magic trick look very professional and real. (And if you choose to buy a magic hat, you can get one with a secret pocket from which you can pull out a stuffed animal of choice.
Here are a couple of links of tricks from Paul Weatherbee that are easy to learn and perform for the novice magician, and real crowd pleasers for the kids:
When I asked my 5 year old daughter what she wanted to do for her birthday party, she gave it a lot of serious thought (one of life’s most important questions for a 5 year old.) Her answer? Arts and Crafts. I said to her that she does arts and crafts almost every day, in school, at home, and maybe there is something else she wants to do instead. Nope. Arts and Crafts. And so after a trip to Michaels I came home with a bag full of arts and crafts activities for 20 five year old girls.
At first I thought that I wasn’t really giving this year’s birthday party my all, but that’s what she wanted….so that’s what we did. And the kids had a blast. We spent about 45 minutes doing craft painting. They painted, glued, glittered, and drew on wooden masks and jewelry boxes, and had a great time doing it (by the way, this would only work for an all-girl birthday party. They little boys would be done with the project in about 5 minutes and then would be running around making a mess).
While their crafts were drying, we continues with the party, cake and games, and before they went home, they took their crafts with them.
Welcome to The Birthday Party How To, the parents’ guide to making great and memorable birthday parties for your children.
The goal of this website is quite simple: Provide information to parents about how to make a great birthday party for your child. As you explore the site you will realize that I will be including a wealth of information in many different categories. For parents on a budget, for example, there will be lots of great ‘do it yourself’ ideas. I have found from personal experience (I have three children of my own) that the best parties are the one’s at home. Sometimes this can mean spending a few hours learning some really cool magic tricks, or rearranging the furniture in your house to prepare for 15 little kids running around with chocolate covered hands. If done well however, it can be well worth the effort and a memorable experience for your child.
I will also include my personal thoughts, reviews and ideas for birthday party venues, some more expensive than others. I encourage readers to share their own thoughts as well.
In attempt to make this truly a helpful resource for parents, I will be providing information on where various products can be purchased (and where you can find the best prices!) in preparation for a birthday party.
A month or two before each of my children’s birthdays I find myself scrambling to figure out what we’re going to do this year – and how it will top last year’s party – and I invariably spend hours scouring the Internet and driving around town in search of the best party ideas. Why should every parent have to do this? So, I present to you what I have found, and hope it is of some help. Enjoy!
April 25th, 2012 
Mike 
