I hope you are ready to party because today my guest blogger Erin is sharing the inside scoop from her daughter’s Hawaiian Luau birthday party. Erin is a friend of mine and a wonderful graphic designer, make sure to check out her Etsy shop Molly & Gordon after you read this post.
My son has always stuck to the licensed character party, when it comes to birthdays, meaning store bought invitations, treat bags and thank you notes. And, with a winter birthday, we usually end up hosting his at some location where we just write a check and the kids run wild while some college student wearing a referee shirt wrangles the kids and keeps them on track.
My daughter, on the other hand, has a summer birthday, and always likes to be a little different from her friends. Plus, a couple of years back, she took note of the fact that her mother is a designer by trade, and she could art direct every last little printed (and other!) detail of her party, while I feverishly make it happen.
This year’s theme: Hawaiian Luau.
Yes, the birthday girl turned six this year and invited her friends along for the celebration:
We decided to host in the backyard, sans pig buried on the beach! Hosting a backyard party can be so much fun, if you make sure you keep the time frame down (2 hours, max!) and keep plenty of activities going to keep the kids busy.
As the guests arrived, the birthday girl greeted them with a Hawaiian lei, then we guided them to the picnic table to color Hawaiian coloring sheets until everyone arrived:
Once everyone had arrived, they headed to the yard to run in the sprinkler and play yard games (lawn darts, hula hoops or on the play scape), while my husband and I had a few minutes to visit with other parents and get ready for the scavenger hunt. Which leads us to the next event of the party:
I divided the kids into teams of two and had them search the yard for six items, since we were celebrating a 6th birthday, of course. Upon finishing the scavenger hunt, each participant received a bottle of bubbles to play with while they waited their turn to get tattoos and facepaint…always a HUGE hit at our parties and so much fun for the kids.
We wrapped up with Hawaiian Punch and volcano cake, at the birthday girl’s request:
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Then sent all guests home with their own grass skirt and treat bag with an assortment of fun little items:
It was a really FUN afternoon! I can’t wait to see what she comes up with for a theme next year!
4 comments :
I really like the coloring sheets you made, what a clever way to keep everyone busy while the guests arrived.
Amanda,
It looks like you a real fun little party for the kids. I especially like the scavengar hunt sheets. Very cute.
I followed you over from the Handy Man, Crafty Woman linky party. I would love if you stopped by my blog.
Thanks for sharing,
Laura
Great party Erin! The coloring sheets were very clever…I do that at school for parties too! The cake is awesome…did you make it? Grace is a lucky girl to have such a creative mom!
Yes, I made the cake…it was quite the undertaking! I first made a bundt cake so I'd have a hole in the middle, but realized that it was so short that it looked like a donut on the plate! So, then I made the top to the Big Top Cupcake, filled the bundt cake hole with pudding and plopped the Big Top Cupcake top on top and carved out a hole in the middle. The erupting lava idea came from a friend…melted down red hard candy, drizzled on wax paper, then pulled off and placed on the cake once it hardened back up. The birthday girl thankfully approved