My Town Party -4yr- Refrigerator Box Town

For my daughter's 4th birthday, I considered what she liked to do best and it was play with her dolls. She wanted to invite her friends to bring their dolls (boys could bring stuffed animals) and play.

I built her a town from refrigerator boxes. I cut the boxes so that they were open in the back with doors and windows on the front and the sides served as support for one another. I cut them roof lines and working windows and doors. I painted each in a different color or pattern (polka dots, bright stripes, etc.) to suit the business". I used wrapping paper for wallpaper on the insides of the buildings. Our hometown is "Helena" and my daughter's middle name (as she is called) is "Chele" so we named her town "Chelena".  Of course Randi Chele was the mayor of the town.

There was a grocery store (The Little Piglet) equipped with grocery carts play food and a working cash register with money. Next door was a day care (Tanner's Tiny Tots) with doll furniture and play diapers bottles and toys.

The next business was a beauty salon (Lil Clippers) with two working stations equipped with capes brushes curlers play scissors and all other necessary hair tools. The windows for this business were the holes in the handles for scissors painted on the outside. The next business was a pediatrician's office (Chelena Pediatrics) which was a very effective boo boo station with doctor kits baby scales and band aids.

Next we had Chelena Baptist Church complete with stained glass windows (laminating film with pictures of Jesus colored on them) and a pew inside. There were advertisements for Vacation Bible School on the outside and happy Bible School music playing inside. Next was a hardware store (Poppy's Hometown Hardware) that the boys enjoyed. Inside was a tool bench and lots of play tools for working on any engine or machine. Then there was a pet store (Bailey's Paws and Claws) where we had stuffed pets in cages and pet carriers.

Finally we had a sweet shop (Petty's Parlor) that was equipped with a play kitchen and baking toys and a table set up for guests outside. We also had the Chelena Fire Dept. which was a blow-up fire truck that they could jump in. There was a gas station the Randi Chele station complete with a pink shell on top. It had a gas pump where they could fill up the battery-operated jeeps and cars that we had charged for them to ride.

There were speed limit picture signs: turtle 2 mph in town and rabbit 5 mph on the outskirts.  There was a newspaper the Chelena Times with recent news of all the party guests and pictures. (Ex. Recent vacations a recent hospital trip in the prayer request section etc.) We had the Chelena Express a small train that was pulled with a four-wheeler. All of the food was just the right size for the guests. We had mini hot dogs and hamburgers plantains (the tiny bananas) tiny cookies  just everything in miniature.

The cake was made with 5 little dolls standing on top with pretty icing dresses (made with a mini bundt set of 6 pan) that wished the mayor a Happy Birthday. When the guests were ready to leave they were presented with a Chelena shopping bag full of treats with personalized business labels representing most every Chelena business.

There were baby bottle pops from the day care a toy tool from the hardware store ice cream shaped bubbles from the sweet shop band aids from the pediatrician cookies from the grocery store a comb brush or mirror from the beauty salon etc.

Everyone also got a copy of the newspaper. It was a big success and I think everyone had a great time!  "