The Rainbow Party

Because I have about a million kids I don't do birthday parties very often. We have birthdays just about every month from December-June and I get pretty birthday-ed out. Plus it's really expensive. Poor little Adelaide turned six this year and has never had a party so we figured it was her turn. I've gotten a little tired of all the fancy parties we've been to lately (not going to talk about the party she went to last Saturday where the girls were driven to mini golf downtown in a limo*). So I decided to do a nice party at home (How quaint!). Ada isn't princess-y or frilly so we settled on a rainbow theme. It turned out to be a great idea since you can get rainbow stuff everywhere.

Karina from JustClickPrint designed the invites and I printed them up myself.

I decided to make a rainbow tablecloth for the treat table. It ended up only costing about $15 since it's inexpensive quilting fabric. Not too bad until you factor in the labor costs. You guys, I'm good at sewing but this thing was a pain. Not really difficult, but it takes a lot of time (about ten hours and I knew what I was doing). I started out making a tutorial to show you how to make one yourselves, but by the fourth step all I could think was "don't make this!". It's pretty cute but is seriously not worth the trouble. (Instead you can beg me to loan mine to you.)

In the goodie category we decided to go straight for the sugar. Who wants pizza and fruit when there is candy? Giant lollipops, jellybeans, white chocolate covered Oreos, birthday cake (made by me. Because the tablecloth wasn't enough work. And because I'm a cake snob) . . .

. . . gumballs, licorice and white-chocolate covered pretzels.

I let each girl have an Oreo and a few pieces of licorice when she came in. Other than that the only food we ate at the party was cake and ice cream. When it was time to leave I gave each guest a bag to load up with handfuls of candy (including the giant sucker. I got them at Michael's for $1.49 each. Giant suckers are a great goodie bag treat because kids adore them and they're pretty cheap. A lot of bang for the buck.)

Tissue paper flowers are an inexpensive, fun way to decorate. Plus they don't go flat like balloons so you can make them way ahead of time for your party.

Ada loves crafts so we made Shrinky-Dink necklaces at the party. I traced all the designs the day before and had the girls color them as they arrived. Since the guests were mostly in the 5-6 year range and not very good with scissors I hired India and her friend to cut out the Shrinky Dinks, bake them and assemble the necklaces. Teenage girls are an excellent resource to have on hand at a party. They make great behind-the-scenes helpers.

(That's supposed to be an owl with a rainbow in the background. I drew it free-hand, OK?)

We also did another craft using big posterboards which had been cut into a rainbow and cloud shape (I had Arabella to cut them all out for me. Having six minions kids does have its rewards). The guests painted them with watercolors and glued cotton balls on the clouds.

Even with all the crafts the girls still managed to get a little wild.

Ada was especially happy that her favorite cousin, Daphne, could be visiting from Utah when she had her party.

And because I got a little carried away with the rainbow theme . . .

The party was a great success and all fourteen guests had fun (me, on the other hand? Notsomuch. I was terribly exhausted by the end and when Mister suggested we go out to dinner at my favorite Italian restaurant afterwards I was thrilled. Little did I know that he'd planned a surprise dinner for my birthday** and that a bunch of my friends were there. What a shame that I was too worn out to look excited. Even though I was.)

*The theme of said party was "Six in the City". No lie. I doubt any of the six-year-olds got the reference. At least I hope not.

**Try not to have a baby within a week of your own birthday. It will forever mess things up for you.