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Party Planning Tips for Children's Birthday Parties
1. Choose a theme that you and your child are excited about. Starting with a theme will help the entire planning process from beginning to end. A theme will help you decide on and select the invitations, food, decorations and games. If you don't want a character theme such as Pooh, Pokemon, or Blue's Clues or a style theme such as Fifties, Retro or Construction, select a color theme based on your child's favorites to build your party around such as blue & yellow, or pink, lime green & light blue.
2. Decide on a guest list. Normally the number of guests should correspond to the age of the child. For the first couple of years 3 – 6 guests plus family is plenty. Remember that the child has absolutely no expectations when it comes to these celebrations. Too many guests and "strangers" will result in an unhappy and cranky child. From 3 – 5 we recommend no more than 10. These numbers will alter when your child enters pre-school or school. Make sure to invite either all the children in the class, all the girls or all the boys. Feelings can easily get hurt when children are excluded. If you can only invite one or two children from a class, make sure the invitation and discussions happen outside the classroom. From 6 – 10, the number depends more on the type of party you are having then the age. For example, a slumber party should have fewer guests versus a roller skating party when the whole class might come. Provide a safe, fun, inclusive party for the number of guests invited.
3. For young children, plan the party around naptime. We recommend that you plan the party during the time of day when your child is at his/her best. Don't plan it during the afternoon nap and hope for the best, as it usually doesn't work! With the added excitement of the big day and numerous faces in the home, the results are usually less than ideal.
4. Keep the party short and sweet. You'll be surprised how quickly children can whip through an activity. For children 1 – 5, we recommend one to two hours. This will allow plenty of time for games, crafts, presents and food. From 6 – 10, the time will correspond more to the type of party. Still, we recommend 2 – 3 hours at the most. For children 11 and older, 3 hours is plenty unless you are planning special activities like a sleepover or movie.
5. Select a menu for the party based on the theme, number of guests and time of day. For younger children, we recommend only serving cake and ice cream. It is not necessary to include a meal…most of the food will go to waste. Feeding cake and ice cream is a big enough challenge! Perhaps a few snacks of pretzels, grapes, or candy can be placed around the room. For older children, select a menu that is on theme. For a fifties party serve hamburgers, fries and malts, for a construction party serve sandwiches, chips and drinks served in a lunch box with a thermos. For a favorite color theme, select foods tied to the color. For example, for a "pink party", serve pink punch, pink Jell-o™, pink cake, ham sandwiches, or bagels with strawberry cream cheese. Be creative to tie the menu to the theme!
6. Create an outline or basic flow for the party from start to finish. Plan for more activities than you think you will need. We recommend planning an activity every 15 minutes, but be prepared to be flexible, as some will fly by, and others will consume more time than anticipated. Activities can include: Arriving at the party and "exploring" the playroom/basement, games, cake and ice cream, opening presents, crafts and contests, distributing favor bags and departure. Share your outline with other adults or older children helping with the party so they can be one step ahead of the activities. If the next activity is cake and ice cream, they can have the drinks poured and the ice cream scoop ready for the onslaught of children saying "me first!"
7. Be creative in your decorations from start to finish. Planning the perfect party doesn't have to be hard, just use your imagination. If your theme is based on a book, TV show or movie, take the time to watch or read about it again. This will provide you with a fresh perspective on your theme. For example, if your theme is Pooh, watch a video or two and read a few classic Pooh books. From these you will find the source of much of your party planning. Determine the key elements that people identify with your theme. For Pooh it might be the Honey Jar, a red balloon and honeybees, the main characters Piglet, Eeyore, Owl, Rabbit, Christopher Robin, Heffalumps etc. Use these identifying elements to create games, decorations, cakes and more. If you don't have time to sit and review, e-mail us at Rebecca@ChloesKisses.com and ask us to do the "research" and idea generation for you. We also offer a number of Party Tips on-line that provide insight on a number of different themes.
8. Keep in mind that the same games can be used over and over for different themes. For example, children ages 2 – 8 love to play the Hot Potato Game. It's a simple game where the children sit in a circle and pass around a "hot" potato until the music stops. When the music stops whoever is holding the potato is out. The music starts up again and around the hot potato goes. The last person in the game is the winner. This game can be adapted for almost any theme. For Pokemon, pass Pikachu and play a Pokemon CD for the music, for Pooh, pass around a stuffed Pooh Bear or Honey Pot, and play House at Pooh Corner or Winnie the Pooh from Disney. For a Retro theme, pass around a peace sign and play old Disco Music. Most games can be easily adapted to any theme.
9. Decorate the house from top to bottom. Let your child know how special they are on their birthday. It only comes once a year, and you are creating memories that will last a lifetime. Place balloons, signs and decorations outside to identify the house for guests. Decorate the entrance so guests get an instant party hit when they enter the home. Use a thematic cake as the centerpiece for the eating area and place decorations around it. Determine where most activities will take place and decorate the key rooms, and serving tables. If possible, use the favors to be given to guests as decorations. For example, for a construction party, have construction hats as favors, but also use them to decorate the party room.
10. Never underestimate the power of a child seeing their name in print. Personalizing items for a birthday is a wonderful way to make your child feel special. ChloesKisses.com offers a number of different items that can be personalized. Napkins are a great way to start. Imprint a napkin to match your theme and colors. For a construction party imprint your napkins with Billy's Bulldozer Bash with an image of a bulldozer. The same imprint can be placed on stadium cups, frames, key tags and a variety of other products. We also recommend personalizing favors for the party guests. Using a simple paint pen, write the name of each guest on the favor if appropriate. For a construction party, write each guest's name on the back of a construction hat. Writing the guests name on tote bags allows each guest to collect favors and candy to reduce the "end of the party hassle"
11. Children love to feel like they are part of a group. Whenever possible, we recommend providing an element at the start of the party to bring everyone together. This might be an outfit, bandanna, hairstyle, face paint or something similar. A few examples include: dressing all guests in hula skirts and leis for a Hawaiian party, dressing the guests in poodle skirts for a fifties party, providing headbands and halters for a retro party, offering cowboy hats and bandannas for a Western party, or supplying pirate patches and pirate hats for a Pirate party.
12. Do as much of the decorating and setting up as possible the night before the party. Save the day of the party for "spoiling" the birthday boy or girl. The night before: review the outline, prepare as much food as possible, finish the cake, layout the cake cutter and ice cream scoop, set the table, decorate the house (inside only, the outside should wait until the morning of the party). Pull out the camera, film and camera batteries. You'll want plenty of documentation of this important milestone. Select music (on theme of course) and your outfit as well as an outfit for the birthday girl or boy (again, on theme if possible!) For first and second birthdays, have 2 outfits ready. One "round" with cake and ice cream can destroy the best party dress!
Above all else, be flexible, and have fun! Our precious children and the important events we celebrate with them should be savored and treasured.