Neverland Party -5yr- I do Believe in Fairies

We had a Peter Pan/ Neverland themed party for my daughter's fifth birthday. She had suggested the idea to me but all she knew she wanted for sure was to play games, make crafts and get to wear her Tinkerbell costume.   

We began with the invitations.  I sent them all out via the computer, but did manage to find a cool free pirate type font online to use for anything that needed printing for the party.  It said, Savannah would like you to celebrate her fifth birthday by joining us as we fly to Neverland on a Peter Pan themed adventure! Come dressed as your favorite Neverland character.  The adventure begins at 3 pm and all the parents are encouraged to refuse to grow up as well.  Please stay to assist your child through craft November 10th.  Need directions to Neverland?  Just follow the second star to the right and straight on until morning of course!  Or call Jess and John for more detail."  The reply information they could choose from   was: "I do Believe in Fairies!" for Yes "Sorry butI have to grow up." for no and "I am hesitating at the nursery window" for maybe's. 

Since the November weather in Minnesota is highly unpredictable we had to hold the whole thing in our house.  And since our friends and family are horrible at being prompt we also knew we couldn't do activities as a group in an organized fashion unless we wanted late comers to miss something.  So I had self-explanatory rules hanging on the wall at each station.    We decorated the mailbox with a large star shaped helium mylar balloon.  As they entered the house the parents were handed a sheet of green paper that explained each of the activity stations they could walk their child through. There was also a basket of extra costumes we had lying around: some bathrobes and a top hat a couple of indian feather headbands and some different plush headbands that made people look like different animals for the lost boys. Some of the parents grabbed some of these.

For the first hour of the party the kids and parents rotated through each part.    In my living room I had set up a Pirate chair for applying Pirate Tattoos I found at Party City.  The chair was simply one of those wooden bench chests we use to put our winter hats and scarves in and people can sit on by the door to put their shoes on.  I had blue red and green bandanas slung over it and mardi gras type bead necklaces hanging out of it.  The tattoos a small scissors and a bowl of water with a wash cloth in it were sitting on a shelf just above the chair.  About four feet away I had put my daughter's My Scene Barbie Throne that plays a royal tune when you sit on it. I decorated it with a few stems of fake flowers and hung her older sister's netting bed canopy thing from an eye hook in the ceiling above it.  On the ledge next to this chair were Tinkerbell tattoos from Party City  a bowl with water and a cloth a small scissors and fairy dust in a fancy little bottle we'd gotten from Walgreen's a while back.  And just a few feet from that was a six foot tee-pee I had found at a garage sale and a bowl with the crayon type face paints. 

On the wall in this room I hung a sign on brown construction paper with words printed in the pirate font I had found that said "Tiger Lily's Tee-Pee: Use a paint stick to make yourself look like an indian warrior get tattooed in the pirate chair or the Fairy throne and don't forget your Pixie dust!"    At the other end of the living room I had a table I covered with a tinkerbell table cloth from Party City and had places set up for three children at a time to paint a treasure chest.  I had found small wooden treasure chest boxes at Michael's for one dollar each.  I had bottles of acrylic paint sitting out on the table paint brushes and paper plates for them to pour small amounts of the paint onto.  I also provided old t-shirts slung over each chair for paint shirts.  Each treasure chest had a slip of paper glued in the bottom that had a small picture of the birthday girl in her Tinkerbell costume and a note that said "Thanks for celebrating my fifth birthday with me! Love Savannah 2007"  The parents helped the kids paint them and then wrote their name on the paper plate and laid them aside on my fireplace hearth to dry.  

In my dining room we had a food station set up.  On the wall was a sign that said "Smee's Banquet Table" with red and white checkered paper for the background (from some scrapbooking store).  Another sign explained the food table and read "Try some delicious shrimp cocktail caught fresh by the mermaids this morning or try some yummy food you can spear with your sword or make your own banana dagger!  To drink we have some Muddy Milk and Pixie Cocktails!" The table was covered with a treasure map table cloth from Party City.  I had little cocktail plastic swords also from Party City in a cup.  Then I used a few divided trays to hold chunks of several kinds of cheese beef log green and black olives grapes mango and strawberries.  The Banana Daggers had instructions for the parents too.  "Cut off about one inch of banana with a knife.  Peel it.  Stick a craft stick into the flat end.  Dip your banana in one of the dips (chocolate pudding strawberry yogurt or Reeses Peanut Butter Ice Cream topping) then sprinkle with your favorite topping (shredded coconut sunflower seed kernels or colorful sprinkles)."  The Muddy Milk was of course chocolate milk and the Pixie cocktails were simply Cherry 7-Up With a Marachino Cherry floating in it. 

There was a sign that pointed them up the stairs to the "Jolly Roger".  At the top of the stairs I had turned our spare room into the game room.  The sign outside said "Climb Aboard the Jolly Roger."  I had burnt the edges of the white part and mounted it on dark red paper.  In the room were three games.  The first one was the cannon ball toss.  The children were suppose to help Captain Hook hit Peter Pan with cannon balls through the clouds.  I took a piece of foam core board and cut a big rectangle out of the middle.  I taped cotton batting/stuffing all around the board so it looked like clouds with a hole in the middle.  I taped this to an upside down tall stool.  Looking through the hole in the clouds on the wall I taped up a picture of Peter Pan (I printed some image I found on line.)  I had purchased a plastic hook type hand thing from Party City.  We had about 20 small black water balloons blown up (not filled with water).  The kids used the hook hand to hold the balloon while stretching back on the knot then letting go snap!  To release the balloon and fire off the cannonball.  The kids got to use a piece of paper to record their name and the number of cannonballs that went through the hole in the clouds. 

Another game in this room was Feed the Clock to the Crocodile.  I had decorated a two-liter bottle with cut up felt to make it look like a crocodile head with its mouth open.  The opening of the bottle was inside his mouth.  The kids knelt on a chair and "leaning overboard" over the back of the chair dropped popsicle sticks into the bottle. Each stick said "Tick-Tock" on one side and a time on the other one o'clock two o'clock etc.  There were twelve sticks.  They got to record their name and the number of sticks that made it into the bottle here also.   

The third game was "Pin the Tail on the Lost Boy."  I used a big piece of tag board and a coloring book to free hand a picture of a lost boy.  All four of my daughters helped color him in.  I cut him out and left him tail-less.  The kids were supposed to first "use their imagination" to draw a tail on an index card write their name on it stick a piece of sticky tack on the back then put on a blindfold.  Using the help of an adults hand they "walked the Plank" (a long wooden picnic bench) then hop down spin three times around and try and pin the tail on the lost boy.    The top two winners of each game won a prize.  I had three Peter Pan books from the dollar store a fairy wand a Tinkerbell coloring book and  little winter fairy christmas ornament craft kit.   

Down the hall from there was the nursery.  It is actually my youngest's room and it has a crib in it.  We put our big bull dog resin statue we have into that room and put a dolly bonnet on her to look like Nana.  Then we copied an idea from another posting on this sight and painted a large piece of poster board with glow in the dark paint from Michael's.  This was soooo much fun!  We covered up the window with a big blanket and hung the painted poster board on the wall.  The light was off but the hall light was on.  The kids would come in to "help Peter find his shadow that he lost in the nursery."  They would stand up against the board (hands wide open or side profiles were the coolest) and we would turn on the light and slowly count to 30.  Then we would close the door turn off the light and have them step away from the wall.  Their shadow would be there in the glow!  The kids loved it! 

They all practiced standing like Peter with his fists on his hips and his feet apart.  One little boy who came dressed like Peter made a perfect Pan shadow!    The next room was my older daughter's with bunkbeds in it.  These were the most fun signs to make.  We called this the Lost Boys Hide Out.  And I smeared the signs with dirt and crumpled them all up.  In this room we simply had a big box of peter pan toys we have and a table with crayons and color sheets I printed off line.  After all of the kids had done all they wanted to at the stations we had the birthday girl gather her friends for gift opening.  We decorated her little rocking chair with string of christmas lights with big colorful flowers on each bulb (Target). 

After gifts we did cake and ice cream (just a huge fairy cake from Rainbow Foods Bakery.)I had grand intentions of making a big Pirate Ship Cake but my daughter saw the picture of this cake at the store and HAD TO HAVE IT!  She really wanted the fairy statue that came atop it. 

Then I led the children to "Skull Rock" (our family room in the basement) where they helped me find a treasure chest (a plastic Pirates of the Carribean Toy from Target). When we got there I said "You know what?  Peter Pan always steals Hook's treasure and hides it in Skull Rock.  I bet if we look we will find a chest somewhere!" It was under a side table.  We opened it and they each got to pick out treats to go in a baggie with their name on it.  The treasure chest contained Pixie Stix candy chocolate gold coins pirate and tinkerbell pencils Pirate and Tink stickers candy necklaces some plastic bracelets and some little kaleidoscope look-thru toys. I also had purchased cool loot bags for the kids to use but on the day of the party I couldn't find them anywhere so we just had to wing it and went with baggies. 

Then all of the kids sat and watched Peter Pan (the 2003 live action version.)  the parents were very helpful and the relatives who came without kids stayed in each room to assist people at the stations.  Everyone had a blast and said they are calling me to help for their next child's birthday party.  I told them about this sight and how I came up with all of my ideas by combining things I read.  The costumes were so fun!  We had a few fairies and Tinks a Peter Pan several lost boys and Pirates two Wendy's and even one Mermaid and one Tiger Lily.   "