Kung Fu Piri Party -6yr- Chinese Lantern Craft

My son wanted a Kung Fu Panda themed party ever since the movie came out! So here's what I did! Since the movie Kung Fu Panda is based on a story in China, it was more of a chinese themed party!

For invitations, I copied an airline ticket and created a new one on my computer. For example the airline name was Piri (my son's nickname) Airlines. The logo was a picture of my son with a chinese hat on and a bowl of rice with chopsticks. The wording was as follows: Date:(date of party) Flight#: PA6(I got that because it was Piri Airlines and he was turning 6) Departure time: 3pm Origin: (hometown airport) destination: BJC-Beijing, China (under that our home address and instead of typing the city and state I put Beijing, China) Zone 1 First Class.

Every person in the family had their own boarding pass. I put all the boarding passes" of the family into one envelope. The envelope was red and had an airplane on the outside. I copied an airplane from a clipart and on the tail of the airplane I put the logo that I created for Piri Airlines using paint on my computer. Also on the front it said "Happy 6th Anniversary Piri Airlines" "Please reserve your flight by calling Piri Airlines prior to your flight at (my phone number.)"

For decorations I bought a lot of chinese lanterns and hanged them everywhere. Also a lot of red black and gold streamers. I bought a lot of black poster boards and made a huge chinese temple and with gold paint I wrote in chinese characters my son's name and stapled it on the wall. Names and frequently asked words can be found at http://chineseculture.about.com/library/name/blname.htm Also I made chinese banners by buying a lot of red poster boards and with black paint I wrote phrases like "Happy Birthday" "Peace" "Love" "wealth" and "Luck" and hanged them all over the place.

Also the entrance to my house I made a huge 3d cherry blossom tree by buying 3 yards of paper at my local supply store twisting it and stapling it to the wall. Then I cut out a lot pink and white paper into different shapes and stapling it around the tree. Hanging from the ceiling was a dragon (like in the movie holding the dragon warrior scroll) holding a sign that said "Welcome to China" in chinese characters.

For activities we colored our own chinese lanterns which I bought at orientaltrading.com Also we played a game called the chinese statues (I got the idea from another member here) which is everyone is moving around in a circle and when the music stops you have to stand still like a statue. The music we used for that one is ofcourse "everybody was kung fu fighting."

Another activity we did was cherry blossom trees. First trace our hands on a brown construction paper cut it out paste it on a white paper and with a sponge cut into very small pieces grab one piece dip it in pink paint and paint leaves all over the tree in a dotting motion. This activity can get messy so I bought plastic aprons from orientaltrading.com

Another activity we did was the game of chopsticks. I bought 4 big chinese bowls and filled it with cotton balls. The kids got in 2 lines everyone had a pair of chopsticks they had to grab as many cotton balls with their chopsticks. When all the kids we're done we'd count to see what group won.

We had a master from a local kung fu school here in our home town come teach kids the basics of the martial art. I asked him how much would it be and he said it was free it was kind of like marketing his school. He left his business card with all the parents and 5 (including my son) of the kids enrolled at the school. Of course we watched the movie Kung Fu Panda. My son wore a chinese silk like outfit for boys with a chinese hat. My daughter and I wore Chinese dresses and a bun on our hair with chopsticks. The outfits can be bought at huadesigns.com

For food and snacks you cant have a chinese party without a chinese buffet. The food was fried rice noodles fried dumplings and sweet and sour chicken. Their were more noodles and dumplings because those were fetured in the movie. Also there were almond cookies ( just like in the movie) that I bought from a local chinese market. I also bought disposable chopsticks from the local chinese market I did put forks out but I encouraged everyone to use chopsticks.

For drinks I got an idea from another member I bought clear kool aid and put in green food coloring to make "green tea." I bought styroforms cups and looked up the chinese character for tea and wrote it on all cups.. Along with every child's name so they wont loose their cups.

The cake I wanted something different so I went to a cake maker and they made a sheet cake with red icing and in black icing it said happy birthday (my son's name) in chinese characters. In the middle of the cake was a panda sitting on the grass eating a cookie this was all 3d and it was all edible. The flavor was half red velvet and the other half was marble. So gooood!!

Before they left I gave each child a red bag with their name written in chinese characters on a cardstock paper stapled to the bag. Inside the bag was a fortune cookie chinese candy that I bought at a local chinese market chinese yoyo crayons decorated chopsticks and a lucky money bag with chocolate coins in it.

This was a huge party that everyone enjoyed and learned new things from another culture. It's been 2 months and everyone is still talking about it. "