Butterfly Tea 5yr - Pass the Cocoon Present

A Butterfly Tea Party for a 5 year old.

Invitations:  I wrote a little poem: Butterflies are pretty and fly so free, come to ----'s 5th Birthday Tea.  There will be games to play and wings to make. There will even be a butterfly cake.  So dress up as pretty as you can be and join the fun at ----'s Butterfly Tea.  Caterpillar on by (date), Butterflies to arrive (time, The (last name)'s cocoon is at (address), Please RSVP by (date) to the Mom-arch Butterfly at (phone).  I had my daughter color a butterfly big enough for the invitation info and then made color copies.  On the other side I printed the above info. I had to print out a couple to get it just right. Then cut out the butterflies. I rolled the invites up and placed a butterfly ring around them.  My daughter and I made cocoons for the butterflies like you would to make a homemade pinata (paper/flour/water).  We put the rolled up butterflies/invites in the cocoons and tied them to tiny tree branches we found at our park.  We hand delivered them so we could watch each girl open the cocoons. 

Decorations:  My daughter wore butterfly wings and anteenas.  For decorations at the house my daughter had been making all sorts of butterflies for the past 2 mos prior to her bday.  We also used butterfly nets we got at the dollar store and later the girls used for their pinata goodies.  We had butterfly plates from the dollar store, for cups I found on clearance the "sip-a-mug" to drink up their nectar juice, placed a butterfly sticker on top of the lid and made nametags and tied to each ucp. 

Activities:  When each girl arrived they were given some wings to decorate.  I got poster bd cut out the shape of wings, put yarn thru the middle for them to wear later.  They used foam shapes, markers, sticker etc to decorate with.  We made butterfly shrinky dinks necklaces, which I pre-cut and hold punched out butterflies for each girl to color and bake.

Games:  Once everyone arrived and finished their wings we played "pass the present" small toys wrapped in layers of tissue paper like a cocoon, the girls passed the cocoon around to music, once the music stops the girl holding the cocoon opens one layer of tissue paper and gets the toy, keep doing this until each girl gets a toy.  (this is where you need to know how many guests are coming, to make the right amount of layers).  Time to find out what butterflies use to smell/fill with play this like Blues Clues each clue hidden has an item to make antennas.  We used headbands from the dollar store, pipe cleaners and pom-poms.  After all the clues were found each girl picked out what color headband, pipe cleaner and pom-poms she wanted.  I had already made holes in the headbands they threaded their pipe cleaners thru the holes on the headband and then I hot glued the pom-poms at the ends.  At tea all the girls wore their antennas. 

Then we open presents.  Next was the pinata, the pinata was made from an oatmeal container, this being the body of the butterfly and then adding card bd cut outs for the wings to each side again using the homemade pinata items (paper/flour/water).  My daugher painted it purple and added foam shapes to decorate it.  I made sure the lid part of the container was facing down on the pinata, this is where I stapled inside the lid ribbon to use as "pull strings" and fill the pinata up with goodies. 

Cake:  After tea we had a butterfly cake, cake was made from 2 round pans, 1 rectangle, the rectangle one was cut in half long ways, used for the body of the butterfly then cut the round cakes in half and using two halves on each side of the body for wings. With the cake, a couple of days before the party I got a cookie cutter and cut the ice cream in slices and cut out butterflies and put sprinkles and them, between each layer use wax paper and refreeze.  

Favors:  Each girl received a butterfly net and each held one ribbon and yelled Happy Birthday ----!  Time to fly...each girl took home their cup, net and necklace along w/ a goodie bag that had butterflies on them, found at the dollar store.  Inside each bag was: 1 butterfly sucker, 1 glitter glue, 1 plastic butterfly, stickers like leaves, butterfly tatoos, non-spill bubble holder/wand with butterflies on them, bubbles and a note attached thanking the girls for coming.  We did take a picture of all the girls in their wings, antennas along w/ their nets.  For thank you notes we found blank butterfly cards at the dollar store.  What fun!!