19970

Carnival Party 1yr - Booth Games

June 2009

Tara in Orangeburg, NY, USA

Honorable Mention

For my son's 1st birthday we decided to throw him a carnival party.

For decorations we rented a helium tank and blew up about 100 bright colored balloons, and tied them in big bunches and put them on the corners of the tent. The tableclothes were also assorted bright colors.  When the guests arrived they came up to an entrance table which displayed a personalized Carnival Happy 1st Birthday sign, which I got at Oriental Trading, also on the table were nice sized party bags with handles that the kids decorated, inside each bag were 15 game tickets, 1 sand art and 1 spin art ticket. Also at the entrance table was a mason jar filled with starburst for all guests to guess how many were in the jar! Each child got 15 game tickets, 1 ticket per game and there were 12 games.

Our games were: (1) Plinko,
(2) lucky ducks,
(3) Coin Toss, they get a bowl of quarters and have to get one quarter to land completely in a circle, there was a small, medium, and large circle,
(4) goldfish toss, where they win a goldfish and bowl,
(5) Cast Away, a fishing game where they  cast a pole into a pool of different colored fish with paper clips on the tips, and which ever colored fish they caught determined their size prize,
(6) Bean Bag Toss,
(7) Basketball Toss,
(8) Baseball Toss,
(9) Milk Bottle Toss,
(10) Color Cups, toss a ball into a box with different colored holes which ever colored it landed in determined size prize, (11) Lollipop Tree, I bought a large stryofoam cone and painted it green, then put tons of dum dum pops throughout, the kids picked a lollipop and if the bottom of the stick had a colored dot they when the large prize,
(12) Knock-Em Down, my husband made this out of wood, it was a huge hit! There are 5 stars on a stand and you have to throw a bean bag to see how many you can knock down, this is very similar to the real carnival game with the fuzzy clown dolls that are lined up in a row!

We also had a spin art booth and a sand art table. For the spin art, I had the kids write their names on the card and when they were done I clipped them to a clothesline( I bought at $ store just for this) so they would dry and they take them home when they left.

We also had a large bounce house which entertained the kids in between games, and we also rented a dunk tank! Also for entertainment we hired a clown who was there for about 2 1/2 hours and she did such a good job with the face painting, I couldn't of picked a better clown! Favors: I had started collecting prizes 4 months before the party because I knew I would need a lot! I would go every couple weeks to target and browsed their dollar spot, which was awesome because they always had gret things, I also bought a lot of the small prizes on Oriental Trading, such as clown noses, carnival pencils, gliders, etc.. To also have prizes for the big kids I bought boxes of ring pops, fun dip, twizzlers, etc.. In total I had about 500-600 prizes for about 40 kids.The kids had the greatest time with this, they even asked me if we could extend the time we had it for, which we did, the company came to pick it up at 8pm, which was perfect because it started to get cold.

Party Snacks: The party was a long party it lasted from 12 noon to 8pm. For lunch we did a bbq, we had hamburgers and hot dogs, mac/pot salads, 2 4ft heroes from local deli. A couple hours later my husband started running the cotton candy machine we rented, and the line formed so quickly, all the kids were excited!

My biggest surprise for my guests came around 3:30, and it was a Mr. Softee truck! We went on the website and found out that you can hire it to come to your party, so we thought what is a carnival without ice cream!! The guests were amazed when they saw it pull up, and even more amazed that we purchased ice cream cones for everyone!

Right after the ice cream truck we took out my son's birthday cake, which was unbelievable! His godmother loves to bake and baked him a huge caked shaped as a #1, and decorated it with big clowns she made out of fondant. To accompany the cake she made about 30 cupcakes, some looked like popcorn, some like hotdogs, soda cups, sitting clowns, and lollipops! They came out so great that people wanted to know if she had a business!

For dinner we had set out a big table with food that we had catered, sausage and peppers, chicken francese, eggplant, etc, we also bbq'd some steak then as well! The party was perfect, so perfect that everyone said it was the best party they have ever been too! It took me a really long time to prepare and lots of money but it was well worth it! The looks on all the kids and adults faces throughout the day will stay with me forever!

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