8400

Race Car Party -4yr- Professional Motorcycle Rider

March 2004

Kathleen in Costa Mesa, CA. USA

Honorable Mention

Race Car party  When my son Nicholas turned 4 years old I wanted to make it a special day for him.  I considered several themes and decided that the Racecar Party would be the most exciting.  

I found a park that has an old tennis court (no net).  I roped the court off with black and white checkered pennant flags (banner store) leaving a 10 foot opening for the entrance.  Using black, red and white helium balloons, I created a large balloon archway at the entrance (easy to do, just tie helium balloons to kite string about 12 apart). 

On the tennis court I wanted to create a racetrack.  I purchased black and yellow duct tape from Home Depot.  With the black tape I made an oval racetrack.  I used the yellow duct tape in the middle to create broken yellow lines (you can also use black duct tape to make train tracks). 

Food and craft tables were covered with either black and white checkered or red vinyl tablecloths (party city).     As guests approached the racetrack they walked between two trees.  Hanging above their heads was a large banner that read, Nick’s Raceway.  I made the banner using a white vinyl shower liner, 10 black vinyl letters (office supply store), and a checkered plastic tablecloth(party city). 

I also borrowed some Goodyear banners from the Goodyear tire store to make it look like an authentic raceway.  I hung the banners from the checkered pennant roping and also from nearby trees.  I borrowed several little tikes ride on cars and remote control cars from friends to be used on the racetrack.  I also had some of my own and purchased others from garage sales.   

I contacted the PR department of our local raceway and was given many promotional items which I included in the goodie bags along with hot wheels cars, hot wheels stickers and hot wheels fruit snacks.  I also contacted the local racing magazines and was given magazines, posters and stickers.  I placed the magazines on the craft table along with scissors, glue and construction paper. 

The kids created very cool racecar collages.  The stickers were for clutches, tires, performance equipment.  We used these stickers to decorate the little tikes cars to make them look like real NASCAR race cars.  The posters were hung on trees as decorations.      

To keep cost down I choose to have the party after lunch and just served refreshments.  We had a racecar birthday cake; Hot wheels fruit snacks, fish crackers and fresh fruit.  Paper products were black, white and red.  For games and activities we had Hot Wheels races using the Hot Wheels from their goodie bags.  You can purchase 3 ft sections of racetrack from Toys R Us for approx. $3.00 ea.  We raced 4 cars at a time.   

For prizes I made checkered flags.  I purchased an extra plastic, black and white checkered tablecloth from party city and wooden dowels from home depot.  I cut the tablecloth into rectangles (approx. 1’x2’ sections) then I glued the plastic rectangles onto the 2’ wooden dowels with tacky glue (drinking straws would also work but wouldn’t last as long (the kids loved the flags!)  

For younger children I set up a 6' child size table with all types of car related toys.  Little People Garage, Lights and sounds steering wheel, car play mat, hotwheels car wash and of course plenty of cars in all shapes and sizes.     

To top it off I hired a Professional Motorcycle rider from the Orange County Fairgrounds to come to the party with his motorcycle and full racing gear.  (Ask around at your local raceway or talk to friends involved in the sport, they have connections.)  Each child sat on his motorcycle, wore his helmet and took their picture with him.  (Very inexpensive-I believe this was good P.R. for him).   

All in all the party was a huge success.  We had a wide age range (from 1-10) in attendance and everyone had a great time.  It took a lot of work to set up so make sure you have plenty of help and allow yourself enough time.  It was well worth the effort.  My son and his friends had a wonderful time.

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