3940

Blue's Clues Party -4yr- Blues Ring Toss

May 2002

Lisa in Garden Grove, CA, USA

Runner-up

For my daughter's 4th birthday we celebrated with a Blue's Clue's party.  About a month before the party I turned my garage into a photography studio. I purchased 4 yards of blue material ($1 yard at Wal-Mart) and I draped this over my clothesline. I dressed my daughter in her Blue's Clues dress and I had her stand in front of the blue material next to a large Blue that I made out of plywood for a game at the party. I also blew up a couple of balloons and sat them on the floor in front of her along with some empty wrapped presents. I took several pictures with my digital camera and then choose the best one for the front of the invitations. I also used this same picture and transferred it onto T-shirt iron on paper and made matching t-shirts for the grandparents, mommy, daddy and of course the birthday girl. On the t-shirts I also added my daughter's birth date and the words "Samantha's 4th Birthday!" and we all wore our t-shirts the day of the. Party. 

For the decorations, naturally everything was blue. For the children I purchased the Blue's Clue's party ware and for the adults I purchased solid blue party ware. I purchased light and dark blue streamers and balloons. For the streamers, I hung these to form a circus tent effect from the middle of my patio ceiling, interchanging the colors every other row. For the balloons I hung six rows of curling ribbon between the streamers and I attached the balloons to the curling ribbon interchanging these colors as well. This came out great and I didn't have to purchase expensive helium. I also printed off about 50 pawprints from nickjr.com and I cut these out and pasted these back to back with a piece of curling ribbon in the middle and hung these down from the ceiling as well. 

For the food we severed blue tortilla chips and salsa, baked beans, turkey and ham sandwiches, appetizer meatballs and potato salad. I also served blue punch to drink along with a variety of other sodas.  For the cake I made a simple sheet cake and frosted it yellow. I then made a round cake and several cupcakes and formed these into Blue's face. (I found this idea off of family.com) I placed this cake on top of the yellow frosted sheet cake and frosted this blue as the directions indicated. On the yellow sheet cake I piped darker yellow spirals onto this, like a wall in Blue's house. Several months before the party I found Blue's Clue's cupcake liner paper's and Blue Clue's candy decorations (these were Blue's face) on sale at Wal-Mart, so I made 18 cupcakes that I frosted blue and placed these candies on top and I sat the cupcakes all around the cake. 

For the games I made these myself. First we played Tic Tac Pawprint. I purchased light and dark blue felt and I made pawprint beanbags. I took a Xerox paper box lid and painted this light blue. I made sections out of cardboard and painted these dark blue and then I sectioned off the box lid into the nine tic tac toe sections. 

Next we played pass the pawprint (hot potato) and we passed around one of the pawprint beanbags. 

Another game we played was ring toss Blue. I found a picture of Blue with her ears standing up and I scanned this onto my computer and blew it up using a poster program I have. I then traced this onto plywood and had my father cut this out for me. I took another piece of wood and nailed a stack to it for a base and then nailed this to Blue's back I then painted the base and Blue accordingly. For the rings I purchased two large embroidery hoops. I separated these and painted all four blue as well. The kids loved this game and Blue was used for the picture I took of my daughter and as a centerpiece decoration for the gift table and now it sits in the corner of my daughter room. 

Blue's Clue's Candyland: At work I am able to get an end roll of roll feed paper. I took this and rolled it out into a giant game board pattern in my yard. I printed off 50 large pawprint pictures (nickjr.com)onto 5 different colors (10 sheets of each) of paper. I then attached these pawprints to my giant game board. I then took the colored cards from my daughter's Candyland game, (the colors that coordinated with the pawprints spaces on the game) and the kids were the pawns. I then took the stack of cards and placed them in a pail and whoever's turn it was I took the pail to that child and they drew one card out and moved to the appropriate color space. This was a favorite game as well. 

For a pull string piñata, I took the box part of my Xerox box and around the top I hole punched holes all around the sides (make sure you have the same number of holes on the opposing side and do not leave large space between holes). Next I took large ribbon (1/2" to 1" wide) and cut this into twice the distance between the holes, I then treaded the ribbon through the holes in a basket weave pattern, leaving long pieces of ribbon hanging down from each side of the hole. Now the top of my box is now the bottom of the piñata.

At the center sides of the box at the bottom I punched two holes on the opposing sides and ran an extra long piece of ribbon through these holes, this is what the piñata hangs from. I then took a piece of purple poster board and covered the box in a arch shape, to form a mailbox. I took a piece of pink poster board and made the face and back of mailbox and attached this to the box as well. I drew the face on mailbox and took a piece of red construction paper and made mailbox's flag. (Note I had to line up holes in the purple construction paper so I could thread my ribbon through this to hand the piñata.) To fill the piñata, my husband held mailbox upside down and I took out a few of the middle ribbons from my basket weave pattern inserted the candy and then wove the ribbons back in place. When the piñata is turned right side up the basket weave pattern of ribbon keeps the candy from falling out, so you must make sure the basket weave pattern is tight. Each child takes a turn and pulls on of the ribbons out of the box.

Once enough of the basket weave pattern is pulled out the candy will fall out. Everyone raved about how great of an idea this was and it worked really well. For an easier piñata, a smaller box can be used and instead of creating an actual "something" out of the box, just wrap the box, except the bottom in the corresponding birthday theme paper and hole punch through the paper and the box at the same time, then place a large corresponding bow at the top.  So as to not cause any tears, every child won a prize for every game.

I kept it simple though, with the prizes being a bag of the crunchy M&M's (they come in a blue bag), dog bone cookies that I made and put on cookie sticks, a "Slippery Soap" bubble necklace that I made out of the wedding bubble bottles that can be purchased at party stores along with a long piece a curling ribbon, and the main prize a shovel and pail that I picked up at my local dollar store. I painted eyes and a mouth of the shovel and pail a few days before the party. The pails were converted into goodie bags at the end of the party. 

For a craft we made blue pinwheels. I learned how to make these out of construction paper and straws at Disney's California Adventure, but I have also seen the how to instruction's on the internet as well, but I don't remember the site. The kids got to decorate the construction paper with stickers, crayons, and a pawprint hole punch (found also at Wal-Mart), then I finished them off for them.  This was a great party and everyone had a wonderful time. I got tons of compliments from the parents and I am told a lot of the kids still talk about the great time they had at my daughter's party. My daughter keeps asking me when we can have another birthday party, I'm sure she will remember this party for a long time.

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