Flamikgirls

Tea party is a great way to introduce table manners and etiquette to your children.  It is also a way to inreach kids’ imagination and just have fun.  My girls love tea parties, we do them big and small; with just three of us as well as a large tea party with 15 girls.  This year my girls wanted to invite all of their girlfriend to a tea party on Valentine’s Day.  I always have been a big supporter of social interactions outside of school, so I agreed to host not one but two tea parties, one with three year olds and one with five year olds.  Both parties were a blast.  So, I wanted to share some ideas on what I did that made my parties a success.

There are three main components to a successful tea party: decorations, menu, and activities. First, you need to come up with the tea party theme.  Is it a Birthday tea party, Garden tea party, Princess tea party or Valentine’s Day Tea Party?  Depending on your theme your party invitations, table decorations as well as some activities might vary.  We had a Valentine’s Day Tea Party.  I had to admit, I should have come up with some interesting homemade party invitations, and included my kids in making them, but I just sent out evites (electronic invitations, they have different designs for every occasion, http://www.evite.com).

Once the theme was selected and invitations were sent, you have to create a magical tea party atmosphere with small teacups and saucers, cute napkins, small spoons, small plates, flowers and a themed center piece. Since we had a Valentine’s Day tea party I added rose pedals, and heart shape place mats.

Next to each plate I included a small goodie bag, so kids can have something to take home.  In the goodie bags, they had some stickers, bounce ball, crayons and erasers.  All the tools kids needed to decorate their heart-shaped place matt if they wanted.

Once the table was decorated and ready to go, I needed to think about a menu.

I had four different heart-shaped sandwiches:  ham and cheese, cheese, avocado, and butter and jelly.  You can also have cream cheese with cucumber, peanut butter and jelly or what ever your children will eat.  I had a heart cookie cutters that I used to make small heart shape sandwiches, I also used a large heart shape sandwich cutter.   My sandwiches came out too big, so cut them in halves.  I also decorated each sandwich with a heart to make it more special.  Since my kids don’t drink tea, I squeezed some lemons added some sugar and made lemonade.

In addition, I wanted to have fruits and vegetables.  I had baby carrots, berries, sliced cucumbers and apples.

Once the kids were done with sandwiches, fruits and vegetables it was time for dessert.  I had my coconut chocolate cupcakes with cream cheese frosting (see the recipe in the previous post),

pink M&M cake,

and chocolate candy.

Once the kids were done eating I let them run around and jump off the sugar while I was getting ready for the game.

Depending on the number of kids and as well as the theme of the tea party you can come up with different games and activities.  I had enough kids that I decided to divide them into two teams to play “Cinderella Lost Slipper” and “Tea Cup Race”.
For “Cinderella Lost Slipper” I mixed all the girls shoes in a pile.  I billfold one person in each team and made them find their own shoes then put them on.  Each girl tagged the next one after she found her shoes.  The first team in which all the girls were wearing their own shoes won.  You can do this game without blindfold, just a relay.

Another game we played was “Tea Cup Race”.
I placed a teacup on a chair at one end of the lawn and a bowl of water and a teaspoon at the other end.  Girls were split into teams and did relay to see which group can fill the teacup first by walking with teaspoon of water.

When games were finished, kids played around with each other and the party was over.  The next day, many parents thanked me saying that everyone had so much fun.

I hope my tea party inspired you to have one with your little girl.  Enjoy your time with your children, they are little just for a little.