Hi, there. So much exciting and fun stuff going on right now. A couple weeks ago we celebrated Julie’s 8th birthday. Well, we celebrated it a couple weeks before that just with our immediate family, then waited for the grandparents to come back from Europe to throw a party. In the past, I’ve almost always hosted the girls’ birthday parties outside our home. We’ve had lots of bowling alley parties, a painting party at a local shop, one or two at a giant indoor climbing structure, once in a public park – a risky prospect in Minnesota in September. It always just seemed easier not to have to worry about all the pre- and post-party cleanup, and also planning the entertainment.
This year, Julie wasn’t sure what kind of party she wanted. None of the previous ideas appealed, we weren’t willing to pay the big bucks for Pump It Up, the place where all the kids in the rich suburb just south of us seem to do their parties. Julie decided she wanted a fairy-themed party, and I decided I was finally willing to try a homestyle birthday gig. After all, I’ve been reading about Heidi Kenney’s fabulous parties she gives her kids for years, along with many other fabulous crafty blog moms. They can do it, maybe I can too.
Well, I did. It was a ton of work – before, during and even after. I was incredibly over-stimulated by the end of the day and it took me a good week to fully recover, but it was fun and I think worth it. I started with a bunch of research on the Internet. I wanted a generic garden-fairy theme rather than a Disney-fairy theme. Wholesome and sweet versus commercial and a little bit slutty, ya know? These kids are 7 and 8 – let’s hold onto the innocence as long as possible.
I found some super-cool free printable invitations from Hewlett Packard’s website – link also includes a paper flower wand, an activity guide, place cards, a paper chain, and “shrinkable sprite charms”. HP clearly wants to give you lots of creative ways to use up your printer ink you you’ll buy more. Thanks HP! I printed mine out on my Canon inkjet. Worked just fine. At least one of the moms who received the invitations commented on how great they were. One of the things I dislike about purchased invitations is that you still have to hand write the details on every single card. My handwriting isn’t all that, and writing out all the envelopes is plenty for me thankyouverymuch.
After much planning and prep, the day came and the girls arrived. Oops – and one boy-cousin who was thoroughly pre-warned that this was going to be a very girly party. Each child was offered a pair of fairy wings to wear, and we had some butterfly temporary tattoos as well – slightly less popular. We sat them down to decorate take-home bags for party prizes/favors, and to assemble flower headbands.
I found another free printable sheet of Fairy crown flowers from Disney Family.com – actually, there are instructions to go with it, and links to other fairy party ideas. Yes, they were Disney, but they were just flowers, not the fairies themselves. This flower crown fit well into my theme, although I chose to use green pipe cleaners instead of ribbon because I thought the finished product might hold together better and be easier to put on and take off – the paper flowers on the ribbon seemed very likely to slide around, twist and tangle each time someone decided they didn’t want to wear theirs – but maybe now they do – or not – and I don’t want to be responsible for fussing with ten little head bands on ten little girls while managing the rest of the party. I did buy some ribbons, and helped the girls tie lengths of it to the back of their headbands for added decoration. These projects kept them busy while the other girls arrived, and they seemed to enjoy them.
Before the party, we’d cleaned out our large basement playroom in case of foul weather, but the day turned out to be beautiful, so we headed outside for the games. First up, pixie dust relays. they had to pour the dust from Pixie Sticks into spoons and race across to dump it in a plastic cup, then hand it off to the next team member until they’d filled the bottom. This is me explaining to them how they were going to split into teams of three. Like herding cats.
Here they are during the race. OMG, it took a lot longer to get the tiny little bottom ridge of the cups. If I were to do it again, I would definitely get smaller cups! But they enjoyed it, and they worked together.
Next up, pin the star on the fairy’s wand. I drew this cheesy fairy picture. Drawing is not my talent, mmmkay? But the girls were impressed enough, and they again seemed to enjoy putting on the blindfold and taking a turn sticking a star-shape on the poster. This was way too easy – first girl got the star right in the middle of the wand. Also, some of them got a little bored waiting their turn.
Here’s Sophie getting ready for her turn – Julie is helping me spin her around in an attempt to make it harder.
It’s funny, at the last minute before the party, I was worried that we would run out of things to do before time to do them, so I threw in a “musical fairies” game – I printed a bunch of clip-art fairy related pictures onto card stock, and found a copy of Bippidy Boppity Boo on CD somewhere, and we had our own version of musical chairs. Turns out, we ran out of time at the end, but I choose that over desperately trying to entertain a bunch of sugar-high kids empty handed. The girls liked this one, and decided on their own that they should be skipping.
One more game – drop the clothespin fairy (I used the old fashioned clothes pegs, tied ribbon wings on and drew little faces) into the flower-jar home. They liked this one too. Although – some of the girls started chanting “oops, she died!” when one of the fairies landed outside of the jar. A little morbid, but funny. Some of the other girls asked them to stop after a bit. 
For prizes I’d found a very cheap craft supply place online and bought a bunch of simple needlepoint kits (not all that popular) and fuzzy sticker coloring kits (which were tacky cheap and went like hotcakes). Every child ended up getting a prize – kids who won more than one game either picked a friend who hadn’t gotten one yet, or we otherwise fudged it to work.
Everyone headed inside for cupcakes and ice cream. The grandparents arrived just in time to sing Happy Birthday. I made the cupcakes from the same chocolate cake recipe I always use – the one from the back of the Hershey’s Cocoa box. It’s no-fail and it’s delicious. Especially if you spring for the fancier cocoa powder. I usually make double the frosting recipe, so I have plenty to go around and a little left over to spread on graham crackers and shove down my cake-hole in private once the party is over. Yes, I just admitted that to the world on the internet. Oh! and the cute cupcake papers are Wilton brand. I love that they’re tall enough to keep the cupcake from spilling over and making the crusty edges that always try to stick to the muffin pan and make you want to scream.
After we sing, I always whisper in their ears to stop and think of a really good wish before they blow the candle(s) out. Julie seems to like that.
We had time to open a few of the presents, but I wanted to get the girls outside for one more activity before the parents showed up…I love how the kids always cluster around the birthday child so they can see what’s being unwrapped. I’ve never gotten a good set of present-unwrapping pictures, and I’m okay with that.
Finally, out we went to whack away at the mushroom piñata. I love piñatas. The girls loved it. Inside, there was very little candy, but lots of little trinkets like ink-stampers, fuzzy pens, note pads, fancy hair ties, little mushroom erasers and other girlie stuff. We did a round of everyone blindfolded, then a round of everyone not blindfolded. By then, all the parents were there watching and waiting for their kids. The thing just would not fall apart. I only wish I could show you a picture of me whacking the heck out of that thing, but I think Joe was too busy laughing at me and pulling kids safetly out of my way to take pictures.
And that was it! My awesome in-laws brought Korean food for dinner, and I very much appreciated that, even though I was too shell-shocked by that point to carry on a coherent conversation. Seriously, the party was a success. Julie enjoyed it, and so did her friends. I had fun too. We’ll see if I’m recovered enough to do it all again in February.
Thanks for waiting for this – I’ve got more exciting news on the way, but it’s almost time for the kids to come home and I have to load the dishwasher and move some laundry around first. Parent teacher conferences are tonight, and I’m looking forward to a little face time with the new teachers. It’s always such a mystery what goes on in their little lives when they are away from us at school, and the little glimpses we do get always surprise me.
We always had parties at home, and one of the games was dropping the clothespin in the bottle!! It was close to 40 years ago! Glad to see someone doing the same activities at a home party. Much better than the “bought” fun in my book!!
Wow, I’m taking notes! We’ve always done home birthday parties, but my rule is that you’re allowed to invite as many friends as you are years old. Which so far has rather limited the number of small girls flying around the place. And they’ve been young enough that they don’t really want the organized activities – mostly happy to just play. But now she’s starting to get old enough to want the activities…and has requested a pinata in fact…so I’ll have to get a bit more creative.