19875

Mermaid & Sea Creatures -6yr- Dress-up & Games

May 2009

Wendy in Escondido, CA

Honorable Mention

My daughter had her 6th birthday party with Mermaid and sea creatures under the sea adventure theme.

For the invitation, I took a picture of her in a mermaid costume infront of an underwater scene that we created using fish, crab, squid(that we cut-out and painted) jelly-fish(out of paper plates and tissue paper)and sea weed(that we crumpled and formed from plain green wrapper). I attached the creatures to a plain blue picnic blanket that we hung on a wall. The wordings on the invite went: Calling all mermaids and merboys fish and jellyfish lobsters dolphins and sharks too. Catch the next wave to Mermaid cove and be ready for a fun splash to celebrate Little Mermaid Sarina's 6th birthday bash......". I put the invite in a sandwich bag added some fish conffeti and a little bit of sand.(an idea I got from this site) It was so cute... 

For decorations: On our front porch we hung more of the jelly-fish and crab that we made. We also had blue streamers for waves and some green streamers to look like seaweed(kelp)and white balloons to look like bubbles. I also found on sale a Little Mermaid scene setter at Party City and attached it to our door. In the backyard where we had the party we hung the same underwater scene that we created for the invitation to a blue picnic canopy. We added more groups of white and blue balloons to look like bubbles.  A friend of mine also made sea creatures out of balloons like octopus sharks and fish that we hung under the canopy together with some streamers cut out of a cheap blue plastic for waves. We also hung some other sea creatures streamers and balloons on the fence around our pool. I spread colorful starfish (from OTC)all over the buffet tables.

For Food: For the kids: we made 1) whale wiches (hotdog buns with either tuna or chicken salad for filling with american cheese cut in half for fins; and a string cheese partly separated for the blow horn); 2) octopus (hotdogs where we cut about 3/4 of each into 8 parts for legs that curled up after they were steamed.) 3)Pasta shells with cheese.

For the adults: Filipino pancit(noodles) lumpia(eggrolls) and fruit and vegetable platters. 

The cake was store bought at Vons but it was decorated as an underwater sea scene with octopus jelly-fish and sea weed.  I added a little mermaid and flounder toy that my daughter had to complete the cake scene. It was really beautiful. 

Activities:
1) When the guests arrived the kids had to go to a dress-up station. For the boys they picked a sea creature foam hat(dolphin fish whale shark and turtle bought from shindigz) and a dolphin neclace. For the girls they put on a head dress that I made out of curling ribbons tied to a wire and they also put on some body jewels bought from OTC and a shell necklace that we collected from our trips to Hawaii. Then each kid took a picture with the mermaid clad birthday girl in her cove(the underwater scene we made in the backyard). We also took a group picture of all the kids. 

2) We played "save the sea friends from the sea witch": I dressed up some lollipops to look like mermaids fish turtle crab and octopus using tissue paper pipe cleaners and foam(these are really cute and unique)and stuck them in a big styrofoam.  Then we had the giant balloon octopus(the sea witch) set next to them. The kids were divided into two groups and were told to race to save a sea creature each by doing a crab walk.

3)Another game was the "Sea monster sea monster are you hungry?" game where a monster(a parent)played as a sea monster and tried to catch the sea creatures. Whoever is caught holds hand with the monster and will help catch the other kids.  The kids loved running around.

4) Last game was a balloon toss game to cool them off after all the running.  We also had rented one of those bounce houses for free play. And we opened our pool  later(after games and the cake) for those who brought their swimsuits.

For goody bags: Aside from the dress-up stuff and dressed-up lollipops we put some sand dollar a seashell whistle a sea creature eraser a little mermaid pencil and notebook and mermaid doll for the girls; a dolphin puzzle and shark's tooth for the boys.

Everybody had a blast - kids and parents. It took a lot of planning but I got most of the ideas from this website. "

• Kids Party Home
• Kids by Category
• Kids by A to Z
• Teen Party Ideas
• Holiday Party Ideas
• Nutcracker Ballet