International Celebration -9yr- Traveling the World

For my daughters ninth birthday we decided to have an international, or around the world party.

The invitations were printed from the computer, we made messages in a bottle type invites and included a mini passport detailing the countries they would visit on this journey. When the children arrived they were first transported to japan, where they would taste candy sushi, fold paper into origami animals, and decorate thier asian goodie boxes with koi stickers and others. 

Then, when all guests had arrived I had my younger daughter, age 6, help out by shaking some maracas and announcing that we were off to Mexico. For Mexico we went outside and to the tune of some fiesta music, the children searched for clues #1-10 to find the pinata treasure! Some clues were hard to find, like the ones buried deep into a cooler of ice, and under the sand in our sand box! The clues were all written by hand  in riddle form and placed in plastic sandwich baggies. After finding the pinata, the kids took turns hitting it to get the candy, and the candy bags were brought into the house to put in thier goodie boxes.

The next country was Italy, where the kids all came to the table and made thier own flatbread pizzas using the toppings they liked and got quite artistic with the veggies! While the cheese melted on the pizzas the kids ate salad, breadsticks, and pasta salad, while listening to aome Italian music.

After Italy it was time to go to France. The girls all lined up to get fancy French make-overs complete with French manicures, and fancy feather boas. The boys took their turn making a mock Monet" painting using two large canvases and acrylic paints. Some boys had a black mustache and goatee painted on their faces (with face paint). The finished artwork on the (16x20 canvases) was to be a compilation of circles painted by all of her guests for her to keep in her room afterwards. We chose the colors first to make sure they would compliment her room decor. 

After France it was time to go to England and have tea and cakes. I had the table laid out as an upscale English tea party with fancy teapots and clear plastic teacups for the kids. The cake was ordered from the local bakery and was a Harry Potter theme which is my daughters favorite book series. We made platters of cookies fruit etc and stuck little British flags into them it was just perfect.

After England it was time to go to India. For India I set up a corner of the living room with draped silk linens and  two authentic puppets brought from India when my friend went there last year. I placed a large fouton cushion and some pillows in order to make it feel special. I used henna to make a flower design on the girls and a more masculine looking bracelet for the boys. While they waited for thier turn to get the henna done the kids made 'dancing ankle bracelets' with gold string and bells and had fun trying to dance with thier bells to the soundtrack from the new Indian movie Slumdog Millionaire. I found a video online of a girl dancing traditional indian dance and the kids seemed to enjoy copying her. After India it was time to go to America.

In America the kids all got to play American Idol and sing kareoke on my daughters new machine. I printed out the logo from the actual show and made nametags with the logo and contestant number# on them. While the children sang and danced we ate popcorn and three judges ranked the singers choosing a winner was hard since everyone did so wellbut we gave out stickers to each guest and gave them an honor by labeling them as most interesting most entertaining best stage presence etc...everyone recieved a compliment.

After leaving America it was time to go home and they took with them their goodie boxes filled with the candy they got from the pinata a French manicure set for the girls and a small watercolor painting set for the boys. It was great! "