Carnival Birthday Party - Prizes!

Oriental Trading had a great deal for the type of prizes I needed - they have several options in the size of bag and types of goodies in each.  In addition to the prizes from there, I also got some of the items from the $1 bins at Target and also from the party store.

The more desirable prizes cost more tickets.  I made sure I had a wide range of ticket "costs" so that everyone would be able to go home with some fun.

In order to come up with the number of tickets awarded at the games and how many tickets the prizes would cost, I thought about how many games I had (8, since the photo booth and face painting didn't award tickets), how many games each child could play in about an hour, and the difficulty.  First I assigned ticket prices to the prizes (25, 50, 100, etc.)  In order to earn a 100-ticket prize, a child would have to have played each game twice and achieved most of the goals.  The children were awarded tickets at each game for participation, and a higher amount for achieving the goal (such as hitting the golf ball through the castle).

Some games had levels of tickets: playing the Balloon Darts would win a player 2 tickets for any color balloon and 3 for any white balloon.  For the Shooting Gallery, the player wins 2 tickets for each ping pong ball knocked off the tee.

I had an adult assigned to each game station (or in between two) to hand out tickets and explain the game.  This was the biggest help of all - recruiting help was essential to this being a success!

The prize table was set up, so that the kids could look at the options and decide what to buy.  I bought individual popcorn containers from Target to hold the prizes, and this was each guest's take-home gift.

In the end, everyone's container was very bountiful.

Having a Fantastic Carnival Party:

- Carnival Party - Games
- Decorations
- Food

Carnival Birthday Party - All About Games

My daughter came up with the idea of a carnival-themed party for her birthday, and it was so much fun to get ideas and plan.  I hope what I share can help inspire your next celebration.

From the first mention of the idea, we began planning - writing down ideas, looking in magazines and on Pinterest for decorations, making the list of food we'd have.  From that list of ideas, I whittled it down to what was achievable, and then agreed to consider it a success if I just pulled off 80% of our plan.  This relieved a lot of stress, and helped me prioritize and plan the most important ideas first and save some of the "would be nice if it happened" for "if there's still time."

First, I enlisted help from my family and friends - from saving cans for games to blowing up balloons the week before to pulling pretzels out of the oven the morning of the big day.  The planning and idea stage was about 2 months prior to the party, which helped tremendously in not feeling stressed by the rush to get it all done.  Having time on my side was more helpful than I even imagined.  I'm not someone who typically plans that far in advance for any big event - except for a Disney trip :-). So this was definitely new territory, but all the accolades on Party Day made it worth the effort.

Being on a budget, I listed our game ideas and what materials we'd need to create them.  We narrowed it down the ones that would be most fun for the age group and also least costly.  I tried to use materials we already had around the house or could borrow.  I even had 1 or 2 "maybes" in case we ran out of time or room, or a planned game had to be taken off the list.

GAME SIGNS

The signs for each game were something I started on in advance.  I liked a few ideas I saw with the triangle banners.  I used constructions paper mostly. For some game titles, I used scrapbook paper that fit in with the color scheme (primary colors, mainly red, yellow and blue).  I wrote down game titles for all the planned (and backup) games, so I would know how many coordinating triangles I'd need for each, then all three of my children and I cut them out.   I got them involved anytime I could.  They were excited to be helping.

On each triangle I glued a letter - most of these were cut out with a Cricut® machine that I borrowed.  This saved a ton of time and also looked great!!  I punched holes on the ends and threaded red yarn through to connect them.

A few game signs (with long titles), I printed on paper with a Rosewood font, and matted the sign with festive paper.

PRIZES

With each game, the player earned tickets toward prizes at the end.  I gave a ticket just for participating/trying, but more tickets for obtaining the goal. More details about the tickets and prizes...

1. Balloon Darts ($10.50 for 36 darts at Oriental Trading; $6 for balloons)

For the balloon darts game, I found a fairly large piece of cardboard in our garage and tested pinning a balloon to it to make sure it'd stay with a thumb tack.  I also tested how long the balloon remained inflated (in the garage) to determine how far in advance I could set up the balloons on the board before the party.  Blowing up 5" balloons with an air pump lasted over a week before they began to deflate and lose air.

I wasn't able to find a large selection of multi-colored balloons in the 5" size, so I ended up getting a few packages of tye-dye water balloons, which looked and worked great.

I covered the piece of cardboard in some left over table covers (red, yellow and blue).  Next I fastened (with thumbtacks) all white balloons to form a number 9 in the center (her birthday age). Finally, I filled in the rest of the board with the color balloons.  To earn tickets, I decided that popping a white balloon would also be worth more.

I ended up using about 90 balloons on the board, then blowing up an additional 90 to use for refills as the game was played throughout the day, putting the extras in plastic garbage bags. 

I ordered the darts form Oriental Trading - they had primary, fun colors and in a large quantity, which ended up being the best price.  Each player received three darts.  I rewarded 2 tickets for each balloon; 3 if it were a white one.

2. Clothespin Drop ($0)

I used an empty glass candle jar (about 9" tall), cleaned it out with lamp oil, to remove the wax. The kids painted a couple of clothespins, and this was placed on an outdoor blanket for the game.  The object is to stand over the jar, hold the clothespin to your nose and try to drop it in the jar.  We gave each player three pins.

3. Bottle Bowling ($4 water bottles)

For this, I decided to use water bottles as the pins.  I had the kids test out several types of balls in advance to decide which was the most successful, but also challenging, in knocking them down.  We ended up using baseballs, which were a perfect weight to knock down the filed bottles. I kept the lids and filled the bottles with water, nearly to the top, which ended up weighing right at one pound each.  For a festive disguise, I covered the bottles in some colorful scrapbook paper.  I used a piece of 1/4" board from our garage as the alley and drew the arrows on it with a red marker, to emulate a bowling lane.  Any flat surface would work - if using a sidewalk, patio or driveway, you could use chalk to draw the triangles.

4. Photo Booth ($3 for props)

For the "stage, I used a nylon puppet theater to set the stage for our photo booth.  I had this in a "donate" bag, but pulled it out for the party, when I saw this idea. I looked at ideas for props, and even saw some in the store later, but cut out my own with construction paper and glued them to bamboo skewers. I also had the kids look through former dress-up costumes for fun things like hats and silly glasses.

I set this up by taping it (on the top) to our swing set.  I had the kids use props and pose for pictures ahead of time.  Then I printed off a few photos to show ideas for how it worked.

5. Baseball ($0)

For this game, I used aluminum cans (canned veggies), well rinsed.  I also covered these in scrapbook paper to camouflage.  We set this up on a card table and used whiffle balls to knock over.  Tennis balls would have worked as well. The reason we didn't use actual baseballs was because we thought if someone's aim wasn't perfect, a stray whiffle ball would probably be the less damaging or painful.

6. Shooting Gallery ($7 for golf tees; $6 for ping pong balls; $1 for package of three water guns )

This fun game involves shooting water guns at the ping pong balls to see how many can be shot off the golf tee.  I used part of a 2x4 board in our garage, and had my husband drill holes in it, just deep enough to hold a golf tee.  I bought a bag of white golf tees and used the kids’ leftover acrylic paints to brighten them up for the carnival.  After adding some ping-pong balls and a few tiny water guns, this game was complete.  We used a saw horse, covered in a table cover, to hold the board.

7. Ping-Pong Toss ($6 for ping pong balls [used one package for both games 6 and 7]; $5 for clear cups)

Our second use for the bag of ping pong balls was a toss game, into cups of water.  I used clear plastic cups, filled with water.  A few of them had blue food coloring, a few more had red, and the rest were clear.  The colors were worth more points, and also in a more difficult place on the table.  Each player got three attempts.

8. Ring Toss ($1, bracelets; about $12 for bottles of IBC)

Until my dad offered a terrific original Coke crate (which I used), my first idea was using an old box.  I'd cut around the sides so that only 4-5" were left.  Then I used paint to decorate it with red and white stripes.  Since we don't use glass bottled drinks often, I looked for sales and stocked up when IBC went on sale.  I bought some regular root beer (brown bottles) and also some black cherry (in clear.  They make great floats for the kids, if you have trouble drinking all that soda.  For the rings, I used some hard plastic bracelets from the Dollar Store.

9. Mini-Golf ($4)

On a trip to Home Depot one day for some paint, I looked at the clearance shelf and found a gem for one of the games.  It was a wooden, build-it-yourself castle for mini-golf.  This was a great find, because my son would enjoy building it, and it would serve as a fun game - plus the kit was only $3.  Using a small container of mis-tinted paint ($1), this was perfectly-priced game.

10. Face Painting ($12 for paint kit)

My daughter (not the birthday girl) volunteered to paint faces and practiced on the other two the week before.  She drew on a poster the 6 decorations she could do, and had "customers" pick one.

11. Guess How Many Gumballs
We counted ahead of time and filled a Mason jar with gumballs - the closest guess got to take the jar home!

Other ideas we had - but didn't use this year:

- ducks in the pond (baby pool) - picking the one specially marked to earn a prize

- Cake Walk

- Pie in the face

- Bean Bag Toss

- Fishing (using pole with magnet and paper fish in a pool/pond (dry), also with magnet to see how many you can catch

- Bobbing for Apples:  I borrowed a metal galvanized tub for this activity.  However, before the party, some of the kids in the group had become ill, so I decided it wouldn't be a good idea to share water at the party.  Instead I ended up using this for ice and cold water.

Science Party: experiments, snow, explosions, astronomy...

My daughter is very much into science: experiments, space, anything related to science.  She asked for a science-themed birthday party.

I found a great website that had all the materials and detailed instructions for for some really cool experiments to do at the party - everything was very hands-on, so all the guests got to do something fun. Steve Spangler Science (website).

The mentos and diet coke explosion has become fairly familiar.  I thought this would provide some excitement.  I bought several 2 liters of Diet Coke and a pack of Mentos, so we could perform this a few times.  Steve Spangler's website sells a contraption that makes it easy to drop the mentos into the bottle while allowing enough distance and time to run away before the soda volcano covers you.

Inside, we all played with sand that didn't get wet, blue goo worms that went from liquid to solid out-of-water, and tiny gelatinous beads that not only expanded significantly in water, but also took on the color properties of the water:

Also inside, we held a centrifugal force experiment with a bicycle wheel.  By spinning the wheel and tilting it slightly, the person holding the wheel felt strong forces of movement associated with that.

Outside, we continued our fun with some Insta-Snow (from Spangler).  Just add a small amount (I used plastic cups for each person), then combine with water to watch it grow instantly into snow.  It felt exactly like snow!  Amazing experiment - I highly recommend. (You just can't eat it).  It only disappears as it dries out, but you can add more water later to bring it back.

Finally, we took a look at the moon - it was a perfect evening - through my father-in-law's telescope.  It was the first time for most of the guests, so they loved it!

From not knowing how to pull off a "science" party to getting ideas from my father-in-law and some great ready-to-do and kid-friendly experiments from the Steve Spangler site, it turned into a successful evening and one that the kids talked about for months!

Medieval Party

My daughter had taken a field trip to the Medieval Times dinner show, and really enjoyed it, so she wanted to carry that theme onto her birthday party.  She drew up her own invitations, which I replicated on the computer and printed.

FOOD

We thought about what types of food they had during the medieval period and tried to stay with that for the meal.  We included chicken, rolls, grapes, etc.

CAKE
For the cake, she wanted a dragon cake.  I found the idea on the Family Fun website, and it worked wonderfully.  It's made with two round cakes, then cut into pieces and put together to make the shape of the dragon.  Some candy is used to add the wings and other features. I used fruit roll-ups for the wings, butterfinger pieces for the toes, chocolate graham crackers cut into triangles for the scales, marshmallows cut in half and a chocolate chip for the eyes, fruit roll-up strips for the fire.

DECORATIONS
She and I made our own banners to hang around the room.  I looked up a few family crests, and the rest came from her imagination.  We bought felt at the craft store, then cut out shapes and glued them on larger felt pieces.  We found long sticks to hang them on.

 

ACTIVITIES
We bought jewels at the craft store and circle glue dots, then picked up plastic goblets from the dollar store and each of the guests decorated their own royal goblet.

Hawaiian Luau Party

My daughter asked for a Hawaiian Luau for her 8th birthday.  We had fun planning the meal, thinking back to any Polynesian-type meal we'd experienced in the past, including inspiration from Disney's "Spirit of Aloha" dinner.

FOOD
For the food, I made a teriyaki chicken, with vegetables and mashed potatoes (not Hawaiian, but my daughter's favorite side dish).  We had pineapple and other fruit, a salad with Polynesian dressing (home-made), and coconut milk shakes (with paper umbrellas).

CAKE
The cake was a palm tree - I used cupcakes to form the shape, then iced them (second layer) together, so that the design was unified and didn't look too much like separate pieces.  Once the second icing layer was on, I took green decorating icing and drew the palm leaves.

DECORATIONS
I used paper lanterns in various places (above kitchen counters, where food was served, above the party room, above the entryway).  I put an island scene on the wall behind the birthday table, and had lots of bright-colored flowers and ribbons on the tables to match the plates I bought.  I borrowed some silk trees to help give the room and more "outdoor" feel.

I also ordered this luau-girl poster from Birthday Express, where the face is cut out, and each guest holds it up to his face.  They had fun doing that.

I found several Hawaiian-themed serving trays and bowls at the dollar store.

FAVORS
For party favors, each guest received a flower bracelet, flower flip-flop clips, a lei, and some candy. I found coconut cups with straws and grass skirts at the dollar store, and had one for each guest to take home, as well.

FUN
We played Hawaiian music and had a limbo contest.  Everyone was dressed for a luau.

Pirate Party

My son's 6th Birthday party was a Pirate party.  We all had a lot of fun getting ready for this.  I used some ideas from Pinterest and modified some to fit what we had to work with, and our budget.

DECORATIONS
My favorite thing from the party decorations was the Pirate Ship, made from a pumpkin.  Since his birthday is in the fall, this was the perfect time to find a very barnicle-clad pumpkin/gourd in the right shape.

I cut the top and hollowed it out.  I cut three squares into the sides for the cannons.  Taking pieces of the pumpkin that was cut out, I created the cannons to fit inside the squares, and used an apple corer to hollow out the cannonballs that are placed inside.  I used bamboo skewers for the mast heads and large leaves for the sails, tying them together with yarn.

I added a Lego skeleton to the front of the ship.  The Lego pirates came from the Pirates of the Caribbean kit that he was getting or his birthday.

I used popsicle sticks to form a plank and the inside floor of the ship, then added the rest of the Lego pirates.

Other decorations included some old wooden crates we had and a few empty dark glass bottles, which I attempted to stuff with the treasure map. I bought some brown netting from the craft store.  At the dollar store I found a bag of gold chocolate coins (for the kids table), and some gold doubloons for decoration.

FAVORS
For favors, I bought some pirate bandanas (skulls, crossbones, swords, etc.), pirate bouncy balls, eyepatches, pirate tattoos, pirate silly bands and mini-telescopes.

ACTIVITIES
I made a treasure map out of a paper grocery bag - taken apart at the seams and used the inside to draw one.  I crumpled it up to add some age to it.

The location was at a park, which already had a wooden bridge, a rope bridge, part of a ship (front), climbing wall, and other items that played well into the theme and the treasure hunt.  I had my daughter hide gold coins throughout the park and take the kids on the treasure hunt, based on the map we created.

INVITATIONS
I designed the invitations myself and printed them from my color printer, then rolled them into scrolls to hand out.  The kids liked helping with that.

FOOD
I made the cake myself, taking a few ideas I'd seen online and pulling it together into something my son envisioned.  I bought some fondant at Walmart to cut out the pirate hat, skull and crossbones.

For fun snacks, I made blue jello in clear cups with Swedish fish inside.  I also made caramel apples.