Kids party fun

Activities, games, and entertainment enliven the party, provide an opportunity for the children to interact, and can be the most fun and memorable part of a party. Advance planning and preparation are the keys to successful party activities.

Arrival Activities
Simple Arrival Activities, such as making and decorating name tags, gift bags, or party hats, are a good way for children to transition into the party. Provide plain name tags, favor bags, or party hats and a supply of markers, stickers and ribbons. Have an adult available to provide guidance, such as "be sure to write your name on your favor bag".

You can also have arriving children draw on or sign a big Happy Birthday card for your child. Write "Happy 7th Birthday, Jason" (inserting the appropriate age and name for your child, of course) in colorful letters on poster board and then have the children add their names and artwork.

Another fun arrival activity is a "guess how many" jar. Fill a clear glass or plastic jar (with a secure lid) with a known quantity (yes, you have to count them!) of candy, marbles, pennies, tiny toy cars or some other item that ties in with the theme of your party. Decorate the jar and lid with stickers and a bow and place on the arrival activity table. Provide slips of paper for guests to write their names and their "guess" and a small basket or box to collect the entries. At the end of the party award the jar of goodies to the child with the closest guess.

Activity Centers
Activity centers consist of simple activities that are setup ahead of time and are available to the children throughout the party. Children can visit the activity centers between the organized group activities.

Activity centers can be designed for individual children, small groups, or all the children at once, if you have a manageable number of guests. Activity centers can be supervised by an adult or be self-serve.

Activity centers most often consist of simple games or arts & crafts. I purchased some inexpensive games, such as a foam dart board, a bean bag toss, a ring toss, and giant bubble wands that I use year-after-year and customize to the party theme by adding stickers. You can setup other simple games, such as a coin toss (coins into jars or pie pans) or ball toss (balls into buckets, baskets or hoops) using supplies you probably already have.

I also setup an activity center with coloring books and crayons, maze and word search books, and a few small puzzles.

Princess


Disney Princesses


Hula


Jungle Party


Space Mission


Thomas


High School Musical


Hannah Montana


Magic


Pirate


Knight


Dinosaurs


Zoology


Circus


Just Ducky


Sea Life