Cinderella Princess 4yr - Princess Costumes

Princess Party (Cinderella)  My daughter wanted to have a  Cinderella/Princess party with a few of her closest girlfriends for her fourth birthday.  She invited six classmates from her pre-school. 

I made each girl their own princess costume.  I started with short sleeved white leotards from K-Mart and sewed flower decorations around the neckline.  For the skirts, I sewed an elastic waist around 2 yards of tulle (leaving it open in the back so that the girls could walk!).  I then covered the elastic with silver glittery trim. 

For their princess hats, I bought large pieces of silver cardboard, which we rolled into 1 and a half foot tall pointed caps.  I pulled matching pieces of tulle through the points, and trimmed the bottoms with the same silver glittery trim as their skirts. 

When the girls arrived for the party, they went to the dining room (where a beautiful tablecloth was laid out and scraps of colored tulle were tied to the backs of the chairs).  Each girl had a silver "rope" and a bowl of beads. 

They made bead necklaces while we waited for all of the girls to arrive.  Once they arrived, they were escorted to the living room, where all of their color coordinated princess costumes were hanging (on a wrapping paper roll!).  They donned their leotards, tulle skirts, princess hats and added their own necklaces.  They picked shoes from my daughter's assortment of dress-up shoes. 

They then went to the "ballroom" (the children's playroom), which was decorated with crepe paper streamers, tulle bows and pictures of princesses and castles that I got from Microsoft graphics.   As they entered the ballroom, my husband took a picture of each of the girls in front of one of the castle backdrops.  

The girls then danced (at the ball) and played the game where you have to scramble the shoes and be the first to find your own shoes. 

We then sat down to birthday cake and ice cream, with plastic goblets decorated with stones and filled with "children's champagne (sparkling cider). 

After the feast, the girls got to give their gifts.  In order to make this "manageable" the girls sat in a circle and passed a pumpkin.  When the music stopped, that girl got to give my daughter her gift.  We did this until all of the gifts were opened, at which point we exclaimed that it was midnight, and that the girls had to change into their original clothes before heading home. 

They took home the princess costumes, hats, necklaces and goblets as party favors.  We sent thank you notes and a copy of the photo to each girl.