Sara's Princess 5yr - Fancy Popsicle Frames

5 Year old Princess Party My daughter Sara wanted to have a dress up princess party for her 5th birthday party.  I love having parties butI try to plan my three childrens birthday parties at the beginning of the year so I can watch for things on sale.  If you watch your Sunday sale ads for party store sales or Michaels usually always has 50% off coupons in their ads.  I decided to skip all the matching Disney Princess stuff since my daughter invited all the girls in her class at school and I knew that not all of them would have Disney costumes.  

First thing to do make invites - I made my own.  I downloaded a castle and crown off of the internet loaded it onto Microsoft Publisher and used my own wording.  You know date, time, place and dress in princess attire, RSVP.  I then rolled them up and tied with pink ribbon and hand delivered all that I could and the rest went in the mail. 

Next I wanted to make the treat bags. Since this was a princess theme I used pink sacks from Michaels.  I found a crown stamp (at Micheals) and stamped a purple crown onto each side of the sack with acrylic paint.  When that dried I cut craft feather boa (from Michaels) and hot glued it onto the top of one side of the sack. Since this was a dress up party I knew I wanted to take pictures but didn't want to just hand them a picture when they left.  So I got the idea to make picture frames with popsicle sticks. I used large craft popsicle sticks and painted them with white acrylic paint. Then I hot glued them together so that a 4x6 picture could be adhered to the back.  I also used some of the craft feather boa and put it along the top of the frame and along the side I used pink puffy paint(at Michaels) to write PRINCESS on one side of the frame and then the childs name on the other.  Since all of the parents RSVP'd I knew all the children that would be attending and had this done prior to the party.  I had also gotten small treasure chests from Micheals I wanted to use for center pieces.  They got painted pink on top purple on the bottom.  I hot glued gems (found at the dollar store) on the top and put fake coins inside.  I also made cookies on a stick.  Frosted them with pink icing and made my own purple flowers with yellow centers.  I used the flowers along the outside and one in the middle and piped frosting in between, then I placed a clear treat bag over and tied with ribbon.   I used an old basket that I had and put a piced of styrofoam they use for making flower arrangements and put it in the bottom of the basket.  I wove the wire with the decorative stars on it around the handle and around the basket.  Then I stuck the suckers in the basket like a flower arrangement.  So when the kids left they could just pick one out. The night before the party I finished stuffing the treat bags.  I got Cinderella crayons at the dollar 4 in a package for $1.  I printed off color pages from Disney.com, rolled them tied with ribbon.  Also at the dollar store were braclets, rings and lip gloss all in a pkg. of 6 for $1. Earlier in the year I had found flower key chains that were actually a pad of paper, very cute!!  Cost me about $.10 each.  I like to have everything decorated that I can the night before so we got the child size tables from our church.  Rearranged our living room so we could fit everyone.  I put up crepe paper in our dining room.  I used light pink, dark purple, and light purple.  They hung from the outside corners to the ceiling fan in the middle. The day of the party we made balloon arrangements.  If you do a few parties a year you need to invest in a helium tank, they run about $30 at Party City and well worth it.  Saves you time from running to the store and having them blow it up and risk popping them on the way home.  I used pink, purple, white, and one Disney princess balloon that was a gift to my daughter. I made 3 balloon arrangements, one for our gift table and two for the kids table.  Resused cute silver balloon weights that we had from prior parties. I got plain pink tablecloth for the kids table and plain purple for the gift table.  I did use the Disney princess heart shaped plates. Pink silverware, cups, napkins, and dessert plates for the adults.  Most was from the Dollar Store but the princess plates I watched for them to go on sale 50% off.    We also decided that it would be cute to have a "throne" for the birthday girl to sit in.  So I took a dining room chair with arms and put a white sheet, that I didn't care about, over it.  My husband attched it to the chair with plastic tie straps, I used the hot glue gun to glue gems across the back along with gold ribbon.  Then I took a pink sheet that I didn't want to be ruined and draped it over the white but not covering the gems across the top. I set the table for each child, complete with fork, napkin, plate and cup.  

The cake was homemade.  I got the cake toppers from birthday express and my sister in law who is AWESOME with cake decorating made the cake shown with that crown and wand cake topper.  It turned out so cute!! I had everything set and ready to go before the party.  A few snacks for the adults like cheese and crackers, chips and dip, and brie and fruit.  We made pink punch.  When the children arrived I took their picture in front of a scene setter{looked like a castle}.  While we were waiting on everyone to arrive the kids played in our playroom. 

When everyone was here we played 3 games.  While we were playing games my husband was downloading their pictues so he could print them out. 1st game- Jasmine Explain how Jasmine flies on a magic carpet and theme of Alladin.  I used construction paper.  Placed it on the floor, used 10 diferent colors. Play Princess music.  While the music is playing the kids should go from one color of paper to another, when the music stops they have to get on a piece of paper.  Had a younger sibling draw a color out of a basket if your color is called then you are out.  When they got out I gave them princess fruit snacks to eat while the gane was going on.  The last one on a piece of paper was our final winner and got the grand prize-  Disney princess hair ties. 2nd game- Snow White Similar to hot potato.  Pass an apple around and when the music stops that person is out.  The Last person left got the grand prize of soap in the shape of a crown. 3rd game- Cinderella Had the children sit in a circle and gave the birthday girl a wrapped present.  Read the book Cinderella everytime they say Cinderella the kids pass the present whoever ends up with it last gets to keep it. After we played games the kids had cake and icecream and punch.  Then we proceeded to open presents.  After presents the kids played and then it was time to go home.  When they were leaving they got their treat bag, picture frame with their picture in it, and cookie on a stick.  Everything turned out great.  It was very cute but not overdone and all together I maybe spent $100.