Caterpillar and Bug Theme Childrens Party
A couple of years ago a friend's cousin was having her fifth birthday party. I was asked to help plan the party and go along and help with games etc. At the time the little girl ...we will call her Ellie, not her real name... was really into bugs and butterflies and other such creepy crawlies...*shudder* So I decided to plan the party around that. I should say, I was inspired to write this review after reading a review of Curly Caterpillar cake!Rules-Ellie was given quite specific boundaries in terms of her own involvement in the planning and shopping process for the party. She was allowed to invite who she wanted within reason, but the limit was set at 30 children as any more than that would just be chaos.She chose the main theme for the part and she chose her cake - Curly Caterpillar from Tesco. But we found that it was often cheaper and less time consuming to limit her choice in certain area. For example, she was adamant that she was picking the toys to go into the party bags. We compromised here and managed to buy a huge box of bulk party toys from eBay for about 20. Ellie was then allowed to look through them and choose which ones went into the bags and which were used as treats for the party games.The box of toys we bought contained things like bubbles, bouncy balls, various keyrings, small dolls and action figures, children's plastic jewellery, marbles, novelty pencils and mini notebooks. All great little things to pop into party bags. And 20 for about 40 items was brilliant as it allowed us to put something in each bag plus have a few small prizes.Ellie is a very well mannered little girl but her mum still felt it was important to impress upon her that although it was her party, it was important that all the children had a nice day. Ellie was quite up for this and it actually meant that she enjoyed being a hostess for part of the day!Decorations-We're quite good at making things, so between us, Ellie's cousin - Amy - and I made lots of the decorations for the party. As the theme was bugs and creepy crawlies we did have a little difficulty at first but decided to opt for fun, colourful decorations, not anything too creepy or scary.We made a giant caterpillar using balloons all taped together and covered in paper mache. This was brilliant fun!How to make Chloe-Blow up as many balloons as you require - we used 9 small balloons and 1 larger one for the head - Chloe was over 2 feet long!Use double sided tape to tape each balloon on to the next - have the tied end of the balloons all pointing up the way for this part.When they are taped together, flip over the balloons so that the tied end is on the floor. You will need to prop up your caterpillar at both ends or it will roll around all over the place. Then you just slap on the paper mache! You have to use long strips for the joins between the balloons.We just used newspaper and PVA glue for our paper mache. Luckily this was before we had recycle wheelie bins so there were loads of newspapers in the house. Rip the paper up into small pieces and coat it in the glue. Then just layer it on to the balloons until the entire structure is coated, remembering the longer strips to join each balloon.Leave it to dry and add another couple of layers until it is very sturdy.Once she was dry we painted Chloe bright green with a yellow face and large heavily lashed eyes and a big smile! We added various coloured boots along her length; these were just cut from cardboard.Chloe was the centrepiece of our decoration and she took an entire day to make and an additional day to ensure that she was properly dry... but she was worth it!-We also paper mached more individual balloons and made these into large purple spiders and colourful butterflies and ladybirds.Large cut out cardboard bugs were hung from the ceiling, dangling over our heads and there were butterflies of all shaped and sizes dangling from the ceiling, in doorways and on the windows. Many of the butterflies were actually garden decorations bought from Au Naturel - 3 for 3 at the time.We used colourful crepe paper hung in strips from the top of each door just to add colour and had it hung like streamers all over the place.The total cost of decorating the entrance, hall and large front room was about 25 for paint, glue, balloons, card, crepe paper, blue tack, butterflies and a Halloween spider's web.Imagination is key when decorating and it's a great opportunity to allow some children to help; they can make some of the items for decoration, developing hand eye coordination and art and craft skills.Food-It was so much fun to do the food for this party. We made sandwiches and sausage rolls as usual. The real fun was the cakes and sweets!Ellie had chosen a Curly Caterpillar cake from Tesco, so we didn't get to make her actual cake. I love baking though, so decided to make some butterfly cut out cookies and a Chloe Caterpillar jam roll as come kids might not like the chocolate Curly and also, that one chocolate roll was nowhere near enough to go around! If your child ever chooses a chocolate caterpillar, either buy two or bake a second one.I can't remember the recipe I used but it was just a very basic vanilla jam roll recipe. I tried my best to copy Curly in shape, size and style. So were Curly the Tesco caterpillar was covered in chocolate, Chloe was covered in piped butter icing. I made her face using a large dome of Just Roll icing which I coloured pink. This was attached to one end using strawberry jam. I just made her features out of just roll icing too. I sprinkled lots of dolly mixtures across her back and made little boots from various colours of just roll icing. In the end she was a more elegant and much taster version of curly!Other than Chloe the cake and the butterfly cookies, we made sausages and told the children they were barbequed worms - they loved that idea! There were hot dog rolls for the sausages and the kids were asked if they would like a "worm-dog". Again, this went down a storm. Kids love general silliness, so be as silly as you like. The boys took it a little too far by asking for a worm dog and blood (tomato ketchup) BOAK!The sandwiches we made were cut out using the butterfly cookie cutter and also a dinosaur cutter - yes, dinosaurs are not insects, but it seemed to work!All of the "real" food (sandwiches, worm dogs, sausage rolls, pizza) was served to the children as this limited waste and allowed each child to have a portion that was enough for him/her. Some of the excess was put out on a table for them to go back too. The rest was kept for the adults!We really had fun with the sweets. All of the sweets were laid out on a table in various bowls and plates and then covered with a large piece of purple fabric covered in gold spiders which Amy just happened to have lying around! Chloe the caterpillar ran the length of the table and kept an eye on the sweeties. The kids were not allowed to peak at this until after all of the savoury food had been served.We had gummy worms, laces, flying saucers, Jazzies and marshmallows all from the pound shop - bargain! We went to the cash and carry for some of the more odd sweeties... blood filled beetle anyone? There were also fizzy bats and chocolate mice from here.We had bowls of Pringles and popcorn dotted around too.The total cost for food (not including cakes) was around 50 which really isn't too bad when you are feeding 30 kids and 5 adults!Games and Activities-We played all over the usual party games - musical bumps, musical statues, pass the parcel, best dancer - two or three times. As the kids were very young (4-6) they enjoyed the repetition and it allowed us to engineer it so that a boy and a girl won each game haha!We also made up some of our own games such as stick the shell on the snail. We drew a beautiful blue snail with a pink and yellow spotty shell. The kids had to place the shell on the right part of the snail.Prizes for the games came from the box of eBay stuff for the ones who came second and the first prizes were bought very cheaply from the pound shop. There were 10 first prizes and 20 second prizes - making sure every child won SOMETHING.The First prizes cost 10 in total.At the end of the party we decided that we would read a story before the cake came out. I decided to read The Very Hungry Caterpillar. A book most 4-6 year olds are familiar with and enjoy. I read the children the story once, letting the caterpillar turn into a butterfly. The second time around, I read the story up until the caterpillar is very fat. Then I said "and now that the very hungry caterpillar is nice and fat and juicy...we're going to EAT HIM! Mwahahahaha!" The kids found this hysterical and out came Curly and Chloe with five candles on their backs. We sang happy birthday to Ellie and she enjoyed having two lots of candles to blow out.The cakes were cut as the kids played around for the last wee half hour while mums started to turn up and collect them. We found it wise to put the cake into their party bags instead of serving it as we didn't want the usual chaos of "your piece is bigger than mine!"Each child left with a party bag containing a slice of cake, a small toy, a small bag of crisps, a handful of sweeties and a party blower.Conclusion-Overall the party ended up costing 150 which is quite a lot, but having attended the party, some parents actually thought it had cost more like 250, so there was definitely value for money there somewhere. Ellie's mum had wanted her party to be very special as she was born prematurely and five was a huge milestone for the family. Her subsequent parties have not been quite so elaborate but she has enjoyed them all the same.I think that spending this amount of money on a child's party is ok for certain milestone birthdays, maybe 5, 10 and 13. It is time consuming to do this kind of party but as Amy and I were students on our summer break, we had plenty of time on our hands! We love doing things like this too, so if you enjoy making things and being creative and allowing your children to be creative, then this is something that will keep you and the kids occupied for a while before the actual party which is great during the summer holidays.We had a ball planning and hosting this party, but if you are a busy working mum it is probably best to find someone to do it for you - this is what Ellie's mum did and she loved what we created for her daughter.Tweet
A couple of years ago a friend's cousin was having her fifth birthday party. I was asked to help plan the party and go along and help with games etc. At the time the little girl ...we will call her Ellie, not her real name... was really into bugs and butterflies and other such creepy crawlies...*shudder* So I decided to plan the party around that. I should say, I was inspired to write this review after reading a review of Curly Caterpillar cake!Rules-Ellie was given quite specific boundaries in terms of her own involvement in the planning and shopping process for the party. She was allowed to invite who she wanted within reason, but the limit was set at 30 children as any more than that would just be chaos.She chose the main theme for the part and she chose her cake - Curly Caterpillar from Tesco. But we found that it was often cheaper and less time consuming to limit her choice in certain area. For example, she was adamant that she was picking the toys to go into the party bags. We compromised here and managed to buy a huge box of bulk party toys from eBay for about 20. Ellie was then allowed to look through them and choose which ones went into the bags and which were used as treats for the party games.The box of toys we bought contained things like bubbles, bouncy balls, various keyrings, small dolls and action figures, children's plastic jewellery, marbles, novelty pencils and mini notebooks. All great little things to pop into party bags. And 20 for about 40 items was brilliant as it allowed us to put something in each bag plus have a few small prizes.Ellie is a very well mannered little girl but her mum still felt it was important to impress upon her that although it was her party, it was important that all the children had a nice day. Ellie was quite up for this and it actually meant that she enjoyed being a hostess for part of the day!Decorations-We're quite good at making things, so between us, Ellie's cousin - Amy - and I made lots of the decorations for the party. As the theme was bugs and creepy crawlies we did have a little difficulty at first but decided to opt for fun, colourful decorations, not anything too creepy or scary.We made a giant caterpillar using balloons all taped together and covered in paper mache. This was brilliant fun!How to make Chloe-Blow up as many balloons as you require - we used 9 small balloons and 1 larger one for the head - Chloe was over 2 feet long!Use double sided tape to tape each balloon on to the next - have the tied end of the balloons all pointing up the way for this part.When they are taped together, flip over the balloons so that the tied end is on the floor. You will need to prop up your caterpillar at both ends or it will roll around all over the place. Then you just slap on the paper mache! You have to use long strips for the joins between the balloons.We just used newspaper and PVA glue for our paper mache. Luckily this was before we had recycle wheelie bins so there were loads of newspapers in the house. Rip the paper up into small pieces and coat it in the glue. Then just layer it on to the balloons until the entire structure is coated, remembering the longer strips to join each balloon.Leave it to dry and add another couple of layers until it is very sturdy.Once she was dry we painted Chloe bright green with a yellow face and large heavily lashed eyes and a big smile! We added various coloured boots along her length; these were just cut from cardboard.Chloe was the centrepiece of our decoration and she took an entire day to make and an additional day to ensure that she was properly dry... but she was worth it!-We also paper mached more individual balloons and made these into large purple spiders and colourful butterflies and ladybirds.Large cut out cardboard bugs were hung from the ceiling, dangling over our heads and there were butterflies of all shaped and sizes dangling from the ceiling, in doorways and on the windows. Many of the butterflies were actually garden decorations bought from Au Naturel - 3 for 3 at the time.We used colourful crepe paper hung in strips from the top of each door just to add colour and had it hung like streamers all over the place.The total cost of decorating the entrance, hall and large front room was about 25 for paint, glue, balloons, card, crepe paper, blue tack, butterflies and a Halloween spider's web.Imagination is key when decorating and it's a great opportunity to allow some children to help; they can make some of the items for decoration, developing hand eye coordination and art and craft skills.Food-It was so much fun to do the food for this party. We made sandwiches and sausage rolls as usual. The real fun was the cakes and sweets!Ellie had chosen a Curly Caterpillar cake from Tesco, so we didn't get to make her actual cake. I love baking though, so decided to make some butterfly cut out cookies and a Chloe Caterpillar jam roll as come kids might not like the chocolate Curly and also, that one chocolate roll was nowhere near enough to go around! If your child ever chooses a chocolate caterpillar, either buy two or bake a second one.I can't remember the recipe I used but it was just a very basic vanilla jam roll recipe. I tried my best to copy Curly in shape, size and style. So were Curly the Tesco caterpillar was covered in chocolate, Chloe was covered in piped butter icing. I made her face using a large dome of Just Roll icing which I coloured pink. This was attached to one end using strawberry jam. I just made her features out of just roll icing too. I sprinkled lots of dolly mixtures across her back and made little boots from various colours of just roll icing. In the end she was a more elegant and much taster version of curly!Other than Chloe the cake and the butterfly cookies, we made sausages and told the children they were barbequed worms - they loved that idea! There were hot dog rolls for the sausages and the kids were asked if they would like a "worm-dog". Again, this went down a storm. Kids love general silliness, so be as silly as you like. The boys took it a little too far by asking for a worm dog and blood (tomato ketchup) BOAK!The sandwiches we made were cut out using the butterfly cookie cutter and also a dinosaur cutter - yes, dinosaurs are not insects, but it seemed to work!All of the "real" food (sandwiches, worm dogs, sausage rolls, pizza) was served to the children as this limited waste and allowed each child to have a portion that was enough for him/her. Some of the excess was put out on a table for them to go back too. The rest was kept for the adults!We really had fun with the sweets. All of the sweets were laid out on a table in various bowls and plates and then covered with a large piece of purple fabric covered in gold spiders which Amy just happened to have lying around! Chloe the caterpillar ran the length of the table and kept an eye on the sweeties. The kids were not allowed to peak at this until after all of the savoury food had been served.We had gummy worms, laces, flying saucers, Jazzies and marshmallows all from the pound shop - bargain! We went to the cash and carry for some of the more odd sweeties... blood filled beetle anyone? There were also fizzy bats and chocolate mice from here.We had bowls of Pringles and popcorn dotted around too.The total cost for food (not including cakes) was around 50 which really isn't too bad when you are feeding 30 kids and 5 adults!Games and Activities-We played all over the usual party games - musical bumps, musical statues, pass the parcel, best dancer - two or three times. As the kids were very young (4-6) they enjoyed the repetition and it allowed us to engineer it so that a boy and a girl won each game haha!We also made up some of our own games such as stick the shell on the snail. We drew a beautiful blue snail with a pink and yellow spotty shell. The kids had to place the shell on the right part of the snail.Prizes for the games came from the box of eBay stuff for the ones who came second and the first prizes were bought very cheaply from the pound shop. There were 10 first prizes and 20 second prizes - making sure every child won SOMETHING.The First prizes cost 10 in total.At the end of the party we decided that we would read a story before the cake came out. I decided to read The Very Hungry Caterpillar. A book most 4-6 year olds are familiar with and enjoy. I read the children the story once, letting the caterpillar turn into a butterfly. The second time around, I read the story up until the caterpillar is very fat. Then I said "and now that the very hungry caterpillar is nice and fat and juicy...we're going to EAT HIM! Mwahahahaha!" The kids found this hysterical and out came Curly and Chloe with five candles on their backs. We sang happy birthday to Ellie and she enjoyed having two lots of candles to blow out.The cakes were cut as the kids played around for the last wee half hour while mums started to turn up and collect them. We found it wise to put the cake into their party bags instead of serving it as we didn't want the usual chaos of "your piece is bigger than mine!"Each child left with a party bag containing a slice of cake, a small toy, a small bag of crisps, a handful of sweeties and a party blower.Conclusion-Overall the party ended up costing 150 which is quite a lot, but having attended the party, some parents actually thought it had cost more like 250, so there was definitely value for money there somewhere. Ellie's mum had wanted her party to be very special as she was born prematurely and five was a huge milestone for the family. Her subsequent parties have not been quite so elaborate but she has enjoyed them all the same.I think that spending this amount of money on a child's party is ok for certain milestone birthdays, maybe 5, 10 and 13. It is time consuming to do this kind of party but as Amy and I were students on our summer break, we had plenty of time on our hands! We love doing things like this too, so if you enjoy making things and being creative and allowing your children to be creative, then this is something that will keep you and the kids occupied for a while before the actual party which is great during the summer holidays.We had a ball planning and hosting this party, but if you are a busy working mum it is probably best to find someone to do it for you - this is what Ellie's mum did and she loved what we created for her daughter.
