C's birthday - party ideas

[LucyLastic]

Hello. Collective inspiration required, please. I've left everything until the last minute, with the house move and, well, my general apathy.

Her birthday is on 3 May (the Tues), so we're having a small party on the Sat. By small, I mean her best friend (aged 4), her cousins (aged 3 and 6) and I have invited 4 kids from nursery. I say I've invited them - I've written the invites... I'll deliver them tomorrow. So I doubt they will all be able to make it, but anyway.

After a chat with a friend, we came to the conclusion that lunchtime is better than later in the afternoon. I plan on doing pizzas, so I'll prep the dough (spelt and wholemeal) and cook the sauce (tomatoes, garlic, olive oil) and the kids can roll their dough out, spoon the sauce on, add the cheese and toppings, then I'll cook them and that'll be lunch.

I'd quite like to (get my other half to) pot up some basil with them, so they can take that home. I've got a whole load of gold coins that I thought we could hide in the garden, so they can have a bit of a runaround picking those up. I had thought of making crowns - I can cut out the headband from metallic card and I have loads of stick on 'jewels', but can get some other stickers and feathers and whatnot. Although I have found instructions for making chef hats, which look pretty cool (and won't take ages) so I could get some stickers to decorate the head bands of those. What else can we do?

[StJuniper]

If this were me, I wouldn't plan anything else. You've got 3-4 activities-- basil, pizza, crowns/hats, and treasure hunt. Can't they just play in between/around that?

[qbm]

StJ is probably right but if you want something 'just in case' you could do an obstacle course. 10 star jumps, round the big tree, through the hoops kind of thing. Dead easy and was a hit at E's last birthday.

[emzit]

That's plenty of activities... I'd almost say too much. I tend to have a couple of activities and let them choose if they want to do it - like one party game, one craft activity, and balloons lying about the place; the kids invariably mostly ignore the craft, do the party game and run about like nutters with balloons and other toys.

[Ali70]

Sounds like plenty. We had Sproglet's 3rd birthday party yesterday. There were five of them (plus mums) for 3 hours and we did:

Playing in garden/on swing/slide/sandpit
Hunt for coloured balls in garden (each child had their own colour) repeated 3 times because they loved it!
Pass the parcel with those things you throw at doors and they walk down as prizes
15mins then spent racing those things down doors
Decorated crowns with jewels
Picnic lunch
More running round outside and a bit of dancing
They went home and we all had a nap!

It was exhausting but we all had a lot of fun. Enjoy, I'm stealing pizza making as an idea for next year.

[Cofa's Tree]

We're doing something similar for Daniel's birthday which is on a Monday. He's invited about 10 pre-school friends so they'll come straight round after school pick up for a birthday lunch. It's teenage mutant ninja turtle themed, so we're doing pizza (Tesco children's pizzas though), cucumber, strawberries, grapes, etc. Dessert will be jelly with squirty cream and toppings on a table for them to add what they want. Fairy cakes with tmnt cake toppers, and that's it. No games, nothing. Just food and running around! Hopefully both of our parties will work and be fab ...good luck!

[LucyLastic]

So. I invited my friend and her little girl who is C's age, 4 kids from nursery amd C's two cousins. Two of the girls from nursery came along, as did her cousins (half an hour late) and my friend and her daughter. My friend had to leave after an hour as her daughter was double booked (their neighbour's kid was having a party too. Little bit offended, as I made her daughter's birthday cake, and her neighbours didn't even come to her party, but never mind.
I bought a red and white checked cheap table cloth then got some colourful bunting from Wilkos, made chefs hats from card and red and green tissue paper. They all played with dolls to begin with, then I gave them some stickers to decorate little black plant pots. By that time, I'd made the pizza dough, so then they all rolled out their pizza bases and put on their toppings. I put them in the oven while my OH took them outside to plant basil seeds in their pots. Back in for pizza (demolished) and birthday cake. I gave the kids 'thank you' pizza boxes (from Papa John's!) with a children's cookery book, sweets, cake, a balloon amd their rolling pin. They had fun. It wasn't too stressful for me. C had an absolute ball
Hope Daniel's party goes well today, CT x

[Ali70]

That sounds really lovely LL, glad you all had fun.

[qbm]

Oh fantastic LL! Sounds like a great party.