So Saturday was Katherine’s birthday party, the one she invited friends to. It was the first of these sorts of parties we’ve done, and it was a success, I think — though not for many of the reasons we’d intended.
We sent invites to six of Katherine’s pre-school friends, and all but one of them were here. We also had one of three kids she invited from Sunday School, and one kid from the day care at Margie’s office. That made seven visitors, and Katherine made eight. A good number.
Katherine had decided, as earlier reported, on a Scooby Doo theme. That meant I’d already over-indulged at the party store — Scooby plates, Scooby napkins, Scooby tablecloth, Scooby streamers, good stuff like that. I’d also gotten some Scooby-themed bits for the Scooby goody bags.
The party was planned for two hours, 1-3 (probably could have made it 90 minutes without any problems), and we had a full array of Fun Activities planned, most of which simply fell by the wayside as the kids insisted on having unstructured fun. Heh.
I set up a large folding table on the back porch, balloons in Scooby colors tied to each chair. The balloons actually spent a lot of the time horizontal, as the breeze kept things temparate but tangled.
Here’s the agenda, and what actually happened:
- Coloring time When kids arrive, or if any arrive early, they get to do some coloring on the table. Print out many sheets of Scooby coloring templates from the Web. This would cover until about 1:05 or 1:10, by which time all the kids would be here.
What actually happened: The last kid didn’t arrive until 1:45 or so. Coloring was of limited interest, though Katherine enjoyed drawing on the tablecloth, once she confirmed it was okay. A fair amount of kids touring the house, playing with a ball in the back yard, etc.
- “Pin the Bone in Scooby’s Mouth” — standard variation of the old game. I purchased a Scooby poster online, and had plans for making little bones of paper, coupled with tape. The poster would go up on the wall where the BBQ usually lives.
What actually happened: Poster didn’t arrive in time Didn’t have time (nor inclination) to free-hand draw a big Scooby. I suspect, given later events, that it likely wouldn’t have worked very well.
- “Pop the Ghosts” — standard party game of having pairs of kids pop balloons between their backs. Gave it the added frisson of drawing ghost faces on them. Katherine did a great job with drawing the faces, and Margie taught me how to tie a balloon. Great fun!
What actually happened: Getting the kids to pair up was a non-starter — kids wanted had their own ideas of who they wanted to pair with, which sometimes overlapped. And half the kids wanted to just play with the balloons, and the other half were scared of the noise of balloon popping. Game turned into running around with balloons.
Followed up with doing an impromptu Mystery Inc. search for sleeping cats, none of which could be found.
- “Mummy!” — Take one Costco-sized bundle-o-TP-rolls, add one daddy willing to be wrapped up as a mummy.
What actually happened: The kids — well, half of them — had a blast wrapping me up (I knelt to begin with, and then they tackled my legs). The kids as a whole had fun as the Curse of Anubis arose and shambled after them around the house … and then had fun wrapping each other up.
- “Scooby Snack Relay” – Another old stand-by — instead of eggs in the spoon, put a large Scooby Snack (from a box of dog bones) in a spoon, do a short relay race.
What actually happened: I set up two teams (and allowed one ad hoc revision. Went over the rules. Went over the rules again. Some folks (my own daughter among them) got the idea. Others did not. Levels of manual dexterity varied greatly. Interest in the game waned dramatically after each player went through their part of the relay, and by the time the last person on the last team had the spoon, eveyrone else had run inside to chase after balloons.
- Making Scooby Bones: Bake plain sugar cookies, cut in the shape of bones. Give kids colored frosting and sprinkles to decorate. Yum!
What actually happened: Most of the kids enjoyed the activity tremendously, especially the concept that they got to ladle on as much frosting as they chose. Yumminess and gooey messes ensued. It was a good thing we had planned this for the table in the back. The activity ended with lots of hand and face washing. Some kids made extras to bring home.
This particular activity got kudos from the parents for creativity and fun.
We also served, during the party, strawberries, and “spooky chips” (blue corn) with salsa. And, in tribute to Shaggy, little English muffin pizzas. No kid left hungry unwillingly … nor any parents.
- Gift Opening: Around 2:15, do cake and ice cream, and, after initial bites, start hauling out gifts for opening. The climax of the party!
What actually happened: Following up the dog bones with cake and ice cream made no sense. About 2:00, and after hand washing, we gathered the kids into the family room (since the table was, um, way too much a mess). Katherine held court, and all the kids wanted to sit by her and she wanted each kid to sit by her. I enforced fire code and got them to sit back a bit, share pillows, stuff like that.
Katherine did a pretty good job of opening gifts and saying thank you. An attending mother took notes of gifts received from whom. The other kids all wanted to see (and play with) each gift, but things stayed under control. A fun rag doll, a few clothes, a Hippo Dentist game, some toy cell phones (the theme this year), some costume jewelry, etc. Nice.
We’d thought about wrapping some of our gifts for Katherine and giving them to her, but we ran out of time — and that was just as well. This party was for her guests.
- Cake and Ice Cream: Make a fun Scooby-theme cake, serve it up with ice cream. Joy!
Margie made a cake in the shape of a bone — a small rectangular cake with four cupcakes in the corners, all chocolate, frosted with a white cream. Yummy. I bought a Scooby candle, and we pulled out some of the standard wooden numbers we have a set of to put a big “5” in front of it. Very fun, and Margie got kudos from parents for actually making a cake.
The candle wouldn’t stay lit in the breeze on the deck, but that was certainly the right place to serve and eat it, and Katherine didn’t seem to mind. Most of the kids enjoyed it, as did the parents we forced it upon.
Biggest problem was that the kids were already, well, stuffed. They ate plenty, but they could have eaten more if not already full of frosted bone cookies, strawberries, chips, and mini-pizzas.
Sounds like a standard party at my house.
- “Dog, Dog, Ghost!”: “Duck, Duck, Goose,” with another name. Every kids loves it! Great way to kills some time after the gift opening and cake/ice cream, until the parents arrived.
What actually happened: Afterwards, things just sort went into a generic unplanned playing around the house, up in Katherine’s room and castle. We only had about fifteen minutes left before party ended, so that was fine. Parents began to arrive, ate some cake and ice cream, got shoes put on, etc. Parental pressures led to thank-yous and the like, and the kids went off with little goody bags of cheap Scooby swag, plus liberated helium balloons.
We got compliments about how “professional” the party seemed. Some of the parents were amazed that we’d do it at our own house, let alone bake our own cake and cookies. Heh.
It was a good set of kids. I’m glad they didn’t total more than 8, though. We’d originally had this bizarro idea that we’d be inviting 24 or so (if we had to give invites to all the kids in her pre-school class), but that ended up being about 12 (mix of her main pre-school “Brown Room” class and her after-school “Rainbow Room” class, plus some kids from Sunday School and a kid she knows from Margie’s office day care. While they varied in rambunctiousness, they were all pretty well-behaved.
Biggest issue was one kid who is allergic to dairy (something Katherine was very concerned about to make sure he would be okay). Margie bought non-dairy ice cream, and baked cake without dairy, too. Alas, the kid was young enough and gun-shy enough that unfamiliar foods that he didn’t avail himself (indeed, his idea of “cake” was the frosting). One girl didn’t want to play any games or eat any food, but she wasn’t obnoxious about it. Another girl was a year younger than everyone else, but very well-behaved, polite, and self-entertaining (and was looked after by Katherine to make sure she was okay).
Note to my mom — party hats have gotten safer than back when I was a kid.
The parents were all pretty decent sorts. Some just dropped the kids off, some stayed enough to make sure we weren’t going to let the kids play in the broken glass, and some stayed and helped for a bit, or for the whole party. It was nice comparing notes, chatting about schools, and get some kudos on what we were doing.
After all were gone (by 3:15p), we were exhausted. We did get all the decorations taken down, the table cleaned off, the kitchen in some semblance of order. Katherine, of course, had plenty to play with in the meantime. 🙂
Main lesson learned: Kids around age 5 are still young enough that unstructured play is the most fun. They enjoyed decorating the cookies, they enjoyed doing mummy stuff with me, and they enjoyed running around and going up to Katherine’s room. Next year may be different — but I might ask Katherine’s teacher then what the kids are likely going to be ready for.
Katherine, by the way, unprompted, thanked Margie and me “so much” for her party.
We scored.
Huzzah!