How To | Rainbow Birthday Party

It all starts with the invitation. My daughter begged for Yummy Yummy Scented Glitter Gel Pens to make her birthday party invitations. Did you know scented glitter gel pens are essential to the existence of an 8 or 9 year old girl? Well they are. Upon their arrival the colorful array of gel pens led to the idea of a rainbow party. I’d like to say we had the whole house decked out in rainbows (oh, the pressure!), but the reality is that we have had 14 snow days and a couple mornings with school delayed 2 hours and somehow that makes me a lot less efficient in my time management, i.e. decoration making skills. But really, did the whole group of 9 year olds complain, heck no. It was all fun and games (literally) for them. Free printable invitation link below.

How To | The Invitation:

You must, and I mean must, purchase these Yummy, Yummy Scented Glitter Pens by International Arrivals.

In full disclosure I called International Arrivals and begged for them to send me a pack so I could use the pens and pacify my daughter in trade for including a link to their product on my blog. So there you go, that’s how it works.

So back to making the invitations. I designed a gray lettered template for my daughter to trace with the pens and then she did all the little doodles on the front herself. You can download this Free birthday party invitation template. Print the template on an 8.5×11 sheet of paper and then cut in half and fold to create your invitation, then trace with your own pens or markers. Add the needed information like date, time, place on the inside of the card. On the inside of the card we asked the attendees to wear bright rainbow colors!

Click here: Free birthday party invitation template

How To | The Party Games:

1. Ah yes, the old classic, guess how many items are in a container. I must say it was quite funny some guessed 24 or 41. Then two girls guessed within one number of the answer, 139. All the girls were of course thrilled to have scented gel pens to use when writing their answers. They are really fun to write with, I’ve done some notebook style doodling with them myself!

2. The other party game was what I call the Memory Tray game. I played this game with my friends at my 8th birthday party back in the 80’s. Raise your hand if you played this game at your party? To play, place a variety of items on a tray. For example, a penny, a barrette, a rubber band, a birthday candy and so on. Have everyone sit in a circle. Bring in the tray and let everyone look at, but not touch, all the items on the tray for 20 secs or so. Then take the tray out of the room. Have everyone write down as many items as they can remember. Try it, it’s tricky and fun.

3. Sticker on the bottom of the plate. ‘Nuff said, right? You have a sticker on your plate bottom you are the winner.

How To | Food:

I kept the food simple. I picked the girls up from school and knew they would be hungry upon arrival. So I had all the food prepared.

1. Hotdogs in a crock pot so they would stay warmed.
2. This amazing looking rainbow fruit salad shown above. I mean yum! Easy and healthy.
3. Rainbow colors of finger Jell-O.
4. Rainbow Goldfish crackers.
5. Chips
6. For dessert, confetti cupcakes.

How To | Decorations:

I also kept the decorating simple and my daughter did almost all of it the day before (of course it was a snow day). We used a piece of twine, cut to desired length, and hung long pieces of alternating colors of crepe paper from the twine and taped them in place. We used the rainbow crepe paper decor as a backdrop and I took a picture of each of the girls with the birthday girl to place in a scrapbook later. My daughter also hung some coordinating balloons and made some white paper clouds with rainbow streamers hanging down. It was really pretty and simple and don’t forget cheap.

After the party I was thanked profusely by my sweetheart daughter. She didn’t want her party to end! I was just happy she loved it, because that is what really matters to me.

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