Birthday Party Fun
Provided by Kraft Foods
Great parties start here! From musical chairs to make-your-own T-shirts, we've rounded up a goodie bag full of fun and easy party ideas to make your kids' next birthday a blast.
Easy Decorating Ideas
- Hang a banner on the porch; drape streamers from trees; or tie balloons to the back gate to let everyone know where the party's happening.
- Create an arch of balloons for the entrance to the party room.
- Paste snapshots of the birthday boy or girl onto paper plates and hang them around the party space.
- Cut shapes (stars, circles, triangles, alphabet letters) out of cardboard or heavy construction paper and hang them from the ceiling to create mobiles.
- Suspend several balloons above the party space, using a white sheet. Near the end of the party, release the balloons!
- Buy a paper tablecloth for the party table and let your kids decorate it themselves!
10 Awesome Activities
- Have children decorate their own goodie bags. Provide brown paper bags, stickers, sparkles, paints and markers.
- Decorate a birthday shirt. Get guests to bring an old white T-shirt and provide fabric markers and paints.
- Play musical chairs — with a twist! When the music ends, the person left standing draws an animal name out of a hat and acts out the animal for others to guess. Repeat until all the chairs, and animals, are gone.
- Set up a scavenger hunt. Hide candies, party favors, toys or other treats around the house or garden. Each guest has to collect a list of items. Then divvy up the treasure!
- Hold a mini-Olympics. Set up teams and conduct relay races, obstacle courses and a tug-of-war in the park or backyard.
- Bury plastic dinosaur bones in a sandbox and have guests dig for fossils in a mock archeological expedition.
- Host a jewelry party. Set out beads, braids and pendants and let guests make their own baubles.
- Turn present-opening time into a game with a round of Circle Spin. Kids sit in a circle, the birthday child spins a bottle, then opens the present from whomever the bottle points.
- Rent or borrow a karaoke machine and get everyone singing!
- Play Who Am I? Have the person seated next to you write the name of a famous person on a scrap of paper and pin it to the back of your shirt. Take turns asking questions aimed at guessing your secret identity.
