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Thursday, April 19, 2012

Princess Tea Party Preview and Planning a Kid's Party

Here is a quick preview of pictures from the Kid's tea party from this past weekend. I have a good friend who throws at least a half dozen parties like this a year and I don't know how she does it! I was pooped afterwards. I channeled her party mojo for this. The best thing I did was to hire a friend to take pictures, so better pictures than from my iPhone are forthcoming.





How to Plan a Kid's Tea Party

Who: We decided to invite both preschool friends and good friends from Sunday school. This is the Kid's last year at her preschool and we have never had people from school over, so it was great to just relax at home with fellow parents. She also wanted her buddies from church to come, so that was a no brainer, since those moms are my good friends too. It was our first time throwing an all girls party which was a LOT of mini-estrogen, lemme tell ya!

What: We decided to do a princess tea party, since it makes for fun food and decorations.

When: We held the party from 3-5 pm. The majority of kids were 4-6 years old, so there was no concern for messing with nap times.

Where: Our house, as crazy as it sounds. We got lucky and had perfect weather, not too hot or humid, and most importantly, no rain! We set up the tea party food in the formal dining room and set up the area for the girls to eat in the sun room. The parents hung out in the living room and on the back patio. The only unexpected part was that all the kids wanted to see my Kid's room. Which meant 15 girls upstairs. No pressure! Just had to hide the iPad and my breast pump parts. Awesome.

Party schedule (I stole this general timeline my party throwing friend who always seems to have well organized parties for her children).

3:00 - 3:20 - A hands on activity. This could be a coloring page, stickers, decorating swords and tiaras, whatever. This gets the kids together in one space and lets any latecomers ease into the flow of the party. Our activity was decorating straw hats with foam stickers.

3:20 - 3:40 - Eat. We put the kids through the tea buffet to serve themselves and poured tea. While the kids were going through the buffet we quickly cleaned the craft supplies.

3:45: Everybody outside for a group picture. I've never done this before at a party, but the photographer suggested it and I think it was brilliant. It regroups the guests and you get to have the picture before any people leave early. It was a perfect way for them to be surprised when the surprise visitors, the princesses, arrived.

3:45 - 4:15 - Princesses Belle and Cinderella (Party Belles of Nashville) entertained the guests. While they were listening to songs and learning a dance, we cleared out the food and whatnot from the sunroom and got the cupcakes out and got the cake ready for singing.

4:15 - 4:20 - Kids ate cake.

4:20 - 4:30 - I let the kids run around outside to burn off some energy. I used this time to get things cleaned up from the cake.

4:30 - 4:45-ish - Open presents. Which was a free for all on par with the conch scene from Lord of the Flies.

4:45 - 5:00 - Free play and rescue my iPad from nebby five year olds.

5:01 - Collapse and remind myself why we only do a big party every other year.

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