The do's and don't of planning a birthday party for a 5 year old.

I can't believe my little girl is 5 years old. It really seems like yesterday that she was just a little baby. I don't know if it is just me but the same way I am having anxiety about my 30th birthday quickly approaching, I had a really tough time with the fact that McKenna was turning 5. Not to mention the fact that she will be starting Kindergarten in August.

Well, McKenna's birthday is three days after Christmas and I decided that I was going to throw her a big birthday party this year. Up until now she had only had her birthday with family and a friend here and there. I thought I would do it a couple weeks later to give everyone a break after the holidays. My wise mother-in-law told me that that the rule of thumb was, "to invite as many kids as the child is old." Just let me tell you that is very good advice. Of course I didn't take this advice and invited three times that amount (don't number 1). McKenna wanted ALL of the kids from her preschool and all her friends from church plus some. I thought, "yeah, I can do this, how hard could it be?" So we planned the party McKenna wanted, a princess theme, and since there were boys coming we added pirates as well.

The invitation said:

Hear ye, hear ye.....
Come one, come all from across the kingdom.
Her Royal Highness Princess McKenna requests
your presence at her 5th Birthday Party.

Please join us at the Salisbury castle:
Our address, time, date, so on...

Please RSVP the Queen Tia
(phone number) by Thursday, January 8th,
A royal lunch will be served.

The party started and I was still half asleep from staying up late making gift bags for all the kids. When they arrived I had princess crowns and diamond and jem stickers for the girls to decorate and pirate hats with gold and silver pens for the boys.




After they were finished we served pizza for lunch. Did I say that I planned the party to last three hours, yes three hours (don't number two). By this time craziness had set in so I thought it would be a good time to give the kids a bat and some candy. Thank goodness the only thing that was mangled was the pinata.

We came in and had more sugar in the form of cupcakes. I know the parents loved not having their kids for three hours on a Saturday but I'm not sure if they were happy with the condition I sent them home in. She opened her presents and loved all the gifts.


We had just gotten new couches downstairs that came in huge boxes. I decided to save them for the party. We had one box be a princess castle and the other we cut into a pirate ship. I gave the kids crayons to decorate them and they absolutely loved it. I had the pirates invade the the castle and steal a princess and the girls loved going into the pirate ship to save their "sisters".


By this time I was exhausted. I looked at the clock and still had thirty minutes until the party was over. I picked out a gender friendly movie (Aladdin) and had all the kids sit down to watch it until their parents came.

All the parents came and picked up their children unharmed but definitely with a bit of a sugar high. Even though I will never do this again McKenna had the best time and it was worth all the time and energy (do number 1). She is such a little doll and we are so grateful have her in our family.