How to organize a perfect birthday party for your child

Start early

Give yourself at least a month to plan the party. An early start helps in finding venues that suit your requirements, organizing fun activities such as magic, and avoiding the last minute rushes.

Fix the budget

You might not want to keep any limits for this special day, but fixing a budget is critical for perfect planning. A budget will enable you to identify the venue, draw an invitee list, fix a menu, identify activities, and organize gifts. But remember, there is a party possible in any budget! Even if you want to save for the next birthday, you can still organize a good party in smallest of the budgets. Just ask us how.

Book a venue

If your guest list fits in your house, nothing beats a party at home! Just beware of the post party cleaning, it is quite a task! Also, make sure you have enough helping hands to reorganize your furniture and organize space.

For the ones who want to hire a place, our city has a whole bouquet of options to choose from. You can host a party at one of your child’s favorite eating joints such as McDonalds, in your community centre, in a nearby banquet hall or party lawns.

·        Choose a location that ensures maximum participation. For example, if your guest list includes your child’s friends from your housing society, a community centre might be a better option

·        Choose a location that suits your planned activities. For example, if you plan to organize jumping bags, sack races, et al, you need a place with lots of open spaces

Remember that you will need the location for at least 3-4 hours prior to the party time to organize decorations and activities.

Plan activities

This is where you need to let your imagination loose. Trust us you can almost bring a carnival home or replicate games in

Takeshi’s Castle! There are activities available for everybody. For the little ones you can put together a small play area with bouncies and slides, for the bigger ones you can organize magic shows, puppet shows et al.

Our experience also suggests that boys and girls typically have different tastes for fun activities. Girls prefer activities with creative bend such as pottery making, origami et al. Boys need competitive games and outdoor activities such as sack races, dart boards, et al. The secret recipe to make any activity participative is to keep a lot of goody bags as prizes!

However, if you are seeking external help for any of the activities, our suggestion would be to book as early as possible

Mix food with fun

Let us share our secret recipe on food- make it healthy, make it fun. As food is central to your party, try and mix it up with the overall theme of the party. So why call lemonade as lemonade, why not call it the magic potion if your theme is Harry Potter? Why children have pick food from simple bowls, why not decorate them as chests straight out of the Pirates world.

Although children love to the eat burgers, fries, pizzas, you can always trick them into eating some healthy food! Our experience suggests that you can easily replace aerated drinks with juices and shakes, and have fruit salads instead of icecreams.

And you don’t need to sweat on organizing all of this. Just call up any restaurant you like eating in and they will be happy to serve.

Order a cake

Birthday cake remains the focal point of the party. It is the best way to announce your party theme. Imagine having a cake in shape of Barbie doll and the table decorated in all Barbie colors. You can add a bit of fun to the activity with magic candles and bursting balloons. But make sure you book the cake well in advance.

Decorate in style

Decorations can be the magic touch to your child’s birthday. You can create some of the best crafts with balloons and ribbons- a fairy gate, cartoon characters, et al. Mix and match colors to liven it up. And add some customized posters of your child to make it really special!

And if you are organizing a theme party, decoration will be your secret mantra to get it right. A Pirates World theme may be emphasized by organizing pirate caps, pirate tattoos, eye patches, cut-outs of some of the characters, dummy ships and some barrels!

Organize return gifts

The children love return gifts- so you if you get it right, you are sure to hear from your guests on how good your party was! Our secret tip is to add some sweets and a handwritten thank you note to your return gift. We have also found that a single item is more appreciated than an assortment of small little things. In case you have arranged for any hand-craft activity, make sure to arrange some carry bags for children to take away their creation. You can also add some memorabilia from your theme party- stickers, tattoos, sketch pens et al.