Planning a Child's Birthday Party

Little kids are bustling balls of energy and fun, so planning a birthday party will be a blast as long as we take care of potential problems. This article will give you some tips for you to make sure your child's party runs smoothly.

Make sure that the party is not too long.

When kids get tired, they start to get cranky and fight over the smallest things. So make sure that you place a limit on the length of the party. Write the time on the invitation and reaffirm the length of the party to the parents. It might even be a good idea to invite a few parents to stay and help out with the kids. The more adult eyes watching, the less of a chance of accidents happening. The party can be fun without a huge amount of children. So keep things simple and make the guest list short.

Make sure that the favors are safe for children.

Every kid loves to take home a special treat from the party but when children are too little there are lots of choking hazards. Make sure the little toys aren't too small and that instead of hard candy and gum you can use more chocolates and fill the goodie bags with stickers and a themed coloring book.

Think of a theme for your party.

When planning a kid's party the first thing you will need to do is choose a theme. What does your kid love? If he's a boy he might like pirates. If so, get eye patches and make a treasure chest cake. He might also like fire trucks. In that case you can buy plastic helmets for the kids to take home with them. Some girlie themes are fairies, butterflies, princess, Barbies, or ladybugs.

A good idea for a gender neutral party is a jungle themed party.

If you decide to throw a jungle party you can ask a friend to do face painting at the party. Little kids can have just the whiskers painted on as they get a bit squirmy to paint a whole face like a tiger or monkey. Another fun game is to play pin the tail on the lion.
You can also play animal hunt. Purchase some plastic animals and hide them around the house before the party. Give each child a bag and challenge them to find them. The child that finds the most animals wins a prize.

Spice up the party with arts and crafts.

Why not get some t-shirts and paint them at the party? This makes the party fun and gives each guest a great souvenir to take home. There are other activities that can be done at the party. Large paper boxes can be designed as fortresses or sports cars. Markers and box cutters create the fantasy world. Another idea is to decorate a wagon and take turns giving rides on it. All of these activities require adult supervision.

Cupcakes are a great alternative to a traditional cake.

They make less of a mess and decorating them is so much fun. Buy commercial frosting, or make your own. Use plastic sandwich bags, filled with butter cream frosting and food coloring. Snip the end of the bags, decorate and you’ve got your cupcakes ready to go.


Ginger Myers is a writer for Embracing Home which is a site where you can find backyardigans birthday party supplies and also finding nemo birthday party resources.