I wanted to share the games we did for my daughter’s Balloon Birthday Party. I love looking at Pinterest for inspiration of how to decorate for parties. I like coming up with a theme and colors for a party. It helps me organize my thoughts. I also really like the idea of having a decorated table for a party. I feel like if I have one nicely decorated table I don’t feel like my whole house needs to be covered in decorations. I have a Pinterest board for Balloon/ Hot Air Balloon Birthday Parties if you would like to see my inspiration. One thing I had a hard time finding on Pinterest was ideas for what to do with my little party animals at the party. Do they just run wild for hours? I can’t handle that, nope I need order, I needed a plan, I needed activities for these kids to do. I’m listing all of the games and activities I had on my list and there are even some that could be considered Pinterest fails (I’ll note them). I didn’t even have time to do all the activities (which was good- I wanted to be over prepared rather than run out of things to do).
By the way, I got the cute hot air balloon free printable from Classy Clutter. The photo of my daughter was taken by Butterfly Chaser Photography.
Continue after the jump to see the list of games/activities for the party.
I couldn’t decide between a balloon or a hot air balloon birthday party. So, I did a hybrid of the two (practically the same in my mind). I picked the colors coral and mint because that’s what we wore for family pictures that year. My daughter’s picture would match the decor and I liked those colors.
To get her excited and into the theme we read books about balloons (which is listed as one of the activities but we didn’t read them at her party). I did display the books and they were part of my decor. We also made invitations and confetti balloons to hand out to her guests. Another note I don’t make homemade invitations and personal deliveries for all of my parties; I am all about evites.
The party was two and half hours long. I served lunch. The parents dropped off their children. The ages of the children were 2-6 yrs old. There was some free play while guests were arriving and leaving. I had this list of activities on me during the party so I keep things moving along.
1) The inspiration behind the Balloon Pit is the movie Patch Adams. The birthday girl goes into a room filled with balloons in the movie. I can’t even imagine how many balloons it would take to fill a room. My husband pulled our couch out from the wall (about 18 inches) and filled it with 60 balloons (took my husband an hour to do). We blocked both ends with chairs. The kids walked through the balloons. They loved being completely immersed in the balloons. I filled the “pit” back up with balloons each time the children walked through (which was actually fairly quick).
2) The Balloon Rockets were inspired by a friends lesson at church. I’m going to do a tutorial on these next. They were AWESOME and easy.
3) I like to incorporate crafts into parties because it’s something the kids can take home and we like crafts in this household. I had all of the scrapbook paper pre-cut. The kids simply had to glue them all together (with fun glue of course) to make a hot air balloon. They were invited to color their Hot Air Balloon Craft as well.
4) & 5) These were my pinterest fails. The kids got to pop the Chocolate Balloon Bowls. That was a success but after trying a bit of the chocolate. The latex taste from the balloons was there. So, we stopped eating them and just threw them away. I would recommend popping balloons (we used a push pin- carefully chaperoned by an adult) but not eating the chocolate. There are too many latex allergies no need to add to the bunch. I guess you could find latex free balloons. I didn’t put very much effort into the photobooth and it showed. That’s all I’m going to say about it. They had fun and I just love these giant balloons!
6) For lunch, I served the kids Balloon Crepes. The goal with the crepes was to make them look like a hot air balloon using the different fruits and toppings. As you can imagine with this age group the crepes didn’t look like a hot air balloon. However, crepes were fabulous to serve.
7) Of course we sang Happy Birthday, blew out fun sparkler candles and ate dessert (Chocolate cupcakes and a mini chocolate cake). I put in the invitations “no gifts please” but if you were doing gifts that is obviously an activity to be included.
8) & 9) I don’t think I need to elaborate on the Bean Bag Toss. Pin the Burner on the Hot Air Balloon was my rendition of Pin the Tail on the Donkey.
10) I have fond memories of doing paper mache when I was younger- you get messy and turn paper into a semi hard object. so I thought it would be fun plus really inexpensive to make my own piñata. My daughter and I blew up a balloon, paper mache it, popped the balloon, and filled it with glow sticks. Piñata’s are always a great addition to a party. Thank goodness our theme was balloons because I have no idea how to make a cool shape with the piñata.
A quick note on the other games I have listed that we did not get to. Musical Balloons: I was thinking something like hot potato or musical chairs (or popping the balloons on chairs). Balloon Ping Pong: I have this pinned to my pinterest board. Basically you make paddles out of popicle sticks and paper plates and play ping pong with a balloon. Balloon animals: You know how clowns make cool animals out of balloons. That’s what I was hoping to do. I am so glad we didn’t get to these because I was just going to youtube this and hope for the best. I still have the balloons so I guess I should practice these. Blow the Clouds: we were going to blow cotton balls across the table and see who could get their cloud to the other side the fastest. The kids and I did this on a rainy day and it was just ok. Then the books. I’m so glad I had these as decor and to read before and after the party but the kids simply did not have time for story time during the party.
I would love to hear what games and activities you have done for birthday parties. I am always looking for more.
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