Princess Party 3yr - Princess Doll Cake

PRINCESSES AND PIRATES--3 yr This is a terrific website and I really enjoyed seeing what everyone else did before I began to plan  my own.  My daughter really wanted a "princess party" since she had been to one for her friend and  I told her if she could master potty training she could have her party--she must have wanted this  party pretty  bad because she worked really hard!  I knew I had to give her this party but I was VERY  sick the month before and actually ended up putting this together two weeks before the date with  less than $500.00 including her presents (I wanted to mention this because in reading this site my  two questions were always 'how long did that take?' and 'how much did this cost you?')   I didn't want to leave any of her little boy friends out, so instead of princes, I did pirates!!  The little  boys loved it!! 

INVITATIONS:  I used cardstock that looked like parchment  and printed out on my computer "Hear  Ye Hear Ye!  All fair princesses and fearless pirates!  The Princess Sydney requests your presence at  a party for her 3rd birthday on the (date) from (time)  at the (your name) castle.  Festivities will  include games, cake, treats  and food fit for little royals and scalywags as well as Kings and Queens. Please feel free to dress in your finest princess and pirate attire if you so please."  I burned the  edges of the invites to make them look old and rolled them into scrolls and sealed them with a wax  stamp I had (you could also use a sticker)  We delivered invites by hand.  My daughter got to dress  up in her favorite dress up dress and take them to all her little friends.  I swear this was her favorite  part of the whole thing. 

LOCATION/DÉCOR:  I had the party at my parents home because they have a much bigger yard and  a terfffic play structure for my daughter that I transformed into a "pirate fort" with flags and pirate  signs.  I didn't do too much decorating.  The most eloborate part was the entrance where I put out  arch on the walkway and covered it in white tule.  The guests passed under in and then walked a  "red carpet" made out of plastic red tablecloths taped to the walkway.  I left the front door open and  printed a big sign "Welcome to the castle" There was a basket at the front door for the kids to grab  either a tiara or pirate mask/eye patch when they walked in.  All the activity was held in the  backyard so I used several tables and set up kids tables, adult tables and food tables all covered in  plastic pink tablecloths and balloons.  The birthday cake was made by my mother, she purchased  one of the Betty Crocker cake pans that lets you fill the inside and used the dome section to make a  half-round cake and created/decorated a 'princess cake" in which the actual cake is the skirt of a  doll that is down through the middle of the cake.  She decorated the skirt cake in pink and purple  frosting--it was so cute!

FOOD:  I knew parents would be attending (I wanted it that way) so I knew we needed really great  food.  I decided to set up two different food selections; kids and adults.  For the kids I served pb&j  sandwiches cut into stars, goldfish crackers, potato chips, little watermelon wedges, and pirate and  princess fruit snacks.  The adults had hot wings (HUGE hit with the dads), turkey wraps, chips and  salsa, potato chips, sliced cantaloupe and watermelon, and cookies.  For beverages I had a big tub  filled with ice, sodas and juice boxes and since it was really hot, we set up a smoothie bar.  We had  two blenders filled with different kinds of smoothie and I had someone in charge of just making  sure fresh ones got made every 1/2 hour or so.  For that we had margarita glasses for adults and  little plastic tumblers for the kids.  This was a total smash hit for both ages.  Everything was finger  food, no utensils!  

ACTIVITES/ITENRARY:The party was 3 hours long with activies about every 1/2 hour. When the  guests first arrived I shuffled all the kids to one of the tables outside and we decorated cookie  "wands" I created by baking sugar cookies cut into the shape of stars and then sticking dowels into  them while they were still hot from the oven.  Once they finished decorating, we set the cookies  inside to dry and wrapped them up to take home. We then broke out the food for everyone and let  the kids play and eat for about 30 minutes.  I then gathered all the kids around played "find Snow  White's apples"--basically an treasure hunt to find hidden plastic apples all throughout the yard I  had hidden earlier.  There was one apple for each child (I didn't want more than that since we had  older kids who I knew would hog all the apples from the littler ones if given the chance.)  The  plastic apples were filled with play dough as a fun suprise.  After the apple hunt, we played "Pin the  crown on the princess" using a blown up picture of Sleeping Beauty and crowns made out of  construction paper.  This was a super hit.  Next we opened presents and then let the kids play a bit  more.  Then, my husband set up our super suprise.  We inflated the bounce house my father  purchased at a local warehouse store for the kids.  This did not cost me anything, which was great,  but I know in my area, they rent for about $80.   The kids went nuts bouncing for about 30 minutes  and then it was time to cut the cake.  When the cake was finished, then came the last and final  suprise.  I rented a princess costume and hired one of my babysitters to come dressed up--She  gathered the children around for Princess and Pirate story time and then helped me paint all the  little girls nails while the pirates went out and played in the "pirate fort."  That pretty much filled  our three hours and soon it was time for departures.  Each child recieved a goodie bag.  In the  princess bags went ring pops, cinderella crayons, princess bouncy balls, candy necklaces, bubbles  and princess stickers.  The pirates went away with ring pops, chocolate gold coins, bubbles, pirate  pencils, mini swords, and ready to assemble mini airplanes.   All in all it was a terrific party!   We probably won't be able to top it for a while, but my little girl  certainly knew she was the princess of the day!