Can you help me brainstorm this: birthday party in small apt?

[Kerowyn]

http://familyfun.go.com/parties/part...y-parties/6to8

modify one of these parties.

see if you can move all or most of the furnature out of the living area get large pillows or bean bag chair type of items for a sit down. If your Daughter likes Aladin you can get material and make into flying carpets, sit around the TV and watch the movies. Do a simple dress up with jewelry and all.
Party supplies, crafts, party decorations, toys: Oriental Trading I have used them for stuff at work.
there are lots of party supple places online and wholesalers who will sell small quantity items.

silly string is a good alturnative to water guns.
cotton balls or wadded up tissue paper can become indoor snowballs.

also check at the library or 1/2 proced book stores for books on parties for kids.

[mommytotwo]

Good idea moving all the furniture.

Save chairs for adults.

When it is time for the cake, spread a colored tablecloth on the floor and serve it to the kids while they are sitting on the floor (no shoes).

Is the party going to be soon? If the weather cooperates, do you have anywhere outdoors to go, maybe a park nearby? You could walk the kids there, have them run around and do a couple games, and then come home for the cake (or have the cake there). I know that doesn't help a whole lot since you might not be able to count on the weather cooperating.

If you can limit the guest list, and have a couple adult helpers, you might have the guests dropped off.

It's usually not the kids that are too much for an apartment, its the mother/father/little sister that show up and take up space.

Good luck.

I lived in a small apartment, and for years had to have my kids birthday parties at my mother's house, or some sort of facilities, like we were homeless or something. So I know where you are coming from.

edit: oh, just saw pinetreelover said something along these lines.

[crazyme4878]

I have lived in very small apartments and houses and have had a lot of fun with parties. The nice thing about a small place is that it is easier and cheaper to decorate. My son's fifth party was a dinasaur themed party. The dining area had green shag carpeting, so I cut out palm leaves out of paper bags and spray painted them green, and attached them to cut-down carpeting roles for trees. Then I took an old bed sheet I got at St. Vinnies and spray-painted a dinosaur mural on it and hung it up and presto! A prehistoric house.

Popping balloons to get items out is popular with this age (well, I don't know about girly-girls). You could split open some garbage bags and tape them to the ceiling and fill the "pocket" it makes with balloons. Firmly attach some string to one end and with a pull, you have a balloon drop. In a small room, it doesn't take many balloons to give it a "wow" factor.

[brokencrayola]

A lot depends on how many children you are having, keep it managable. Push furniture back and maybe buy a large tarp to put on the floor. You can then do crafts or eat and not stress about the mess as much. If you do not have too many children and a good place outdoors for the kids and assuming the weather is nice, I would try to get them outside as much as you can. One good thing is to buy each child bubbles, they love that. You could have a treasure hunt where maybe you hide some special prizes outside and give the kids clues to find them.

[plaidmom]

Many good ideas here.

One thought I had (since you live in an apt.): Let your neighbors know in advance.

This would be a courtesy on your part and allow them to plan their day.

[NicoleJ]

You guys are so awesome! Thank you!

[*Danielle*]

I just did a 5 yr old party in my small home... We did move furniture and placed chairs along walls for the adults to sit... I just made sure there was a nice size area for games. We had about 16 5 year olds.
I found it key to keep the kids busy at all times. Avoid random chaos if you don't want them jumping on your couch and bouncing off your walls. When they first arrived they made birthday crowns. I got poster board and cut the crowns for them and had them ready to go. They decorated them with glitter, feathers, stickers, markers etc etc...that took about 25 mins and they did it right in middle of the floor. From there we did games. Pin the tail, ring toss, drop the clothes hanger in the small hole on the can, cotton ball on the spoon race...I had back ups too...Keep them busy! Google birthday party games and you will get a ton. I seved kid friendly food through out. PB&J sandwiches, chicken nuggets, popcorn, pretzel rods, fruit snacks, fruit kabobs, drinks and water etc etc. I brewed some coffee for the adults...and also had soda for them. After the games we ate a bit, did gifts, did the cake and ice cream and topped it off with a pull string pinata...which was filled with goodies and was a huge hit. That all took a good 2 hours non-stop. I found it helpful to have kid music playing in the back round. I even had the hokey pokey ready just incase we needed to go there. All in all, I stressed over nothing. As long as you have a plan to keep them busy it will go off with out a hitch!

[wyoquilter]

Just curious do you or does your child have a theme in mind? I just asked because many of the games and activities I have planned for my kid's B-day parties stemmed around a theme. Like one year we had a Care Bear Party. I decorated the ceiling with Clouds made by cutting two pieces of freezer paper the same then stapled them together around the edges and stuffed with newspaper and hung them at various heights. I also got several colors of streamers and streamed them around the ceiling as well. For an activity the kids made Care Bear masks. I found them on the internet. I printed them out on card stock, cut them out ahead of time, including the eye holes, and paper punched a couple holes on each side to run a piece of small eleastic cording through. We also played pin the heart on Love A-lot Bear. Again found an image on the internet and printed it off with my printer in four page poster size. Then I cut out hearts out of red construction paper.

We also played musical chairs. If you don't have room for chairs you could use some paper squares stuck to the floor with tape and the kids would stand on a piece of paper instead of sitting on a chair. Another game that doesn't take up room is a bean bag toss. You could incorporate a hallway for this. You can have the kids toss beanbags into a small basket or box.

I agree with the other posters about moving as much furniture out of the living space as you can then push the rest as far to the walls as possible. If you are going to do a water gun fight outdoors, be sure that you mention this on the invites so that parents can put their kids in clothes they don't care if they get wet or ruined.

[*Danielle*]

An alternative to musical chairs is musical pillow...have the kids sit in a circle and pass around a large size pillow to the music...when it stops, who ever has the pillow is out. We opted out of that game because I thought kids would not be happy being 'out' while the other's played...to each their own but I just did not want any crying kids...you never know.

[NicoleJ]

wyo, no theme in mind so far.