There are many children’s birthday party themes that go beyond mass merchandised movies and toys. For a fun, classic and nostalgic birthday, throw your daughter a Paper Doll Birthday Party.
Invitations
Either buy pre-printed invites decorated with girls or dolls, or, better yet, make your own. You can fold a piece of card stock and cut a paper doll, leaving the attached hands as the card fold, or cut one or two paper dolls and paste them to the front of card stock or plain, unprinted cards. Either hand-write the party details inside, or print them out on your computer and glue them to the card interior.
Cake
Every birthday party needs a cake. Check out the paper doll cake idea from Famous Brand Names Party Cakes (Vol.7, May 21, 2002, Publications International, Ltd.). Their website is www.fbnr.com.
Basically, to make this adorable and very simple cake you need to cut a set of paper dolls to fit the top of your cake from wax paper, place atop your frosted cake, then sprinkle confectioner’s sugar around the edges. When you lift the dolls away, the paper doll pattern remains. Add finishing touches with candies or shaped sprinkles. One tip – let the frosting dry for a short while before placing the stencil and coating; the wax paper sticks a lot and is tough to remove otherwise.
Decorations
Streamers and balloons will be festive and coordinate with this theme nicely, but there is a very inexpensive and easy way to decorate your home or party room for a paper doll birthday party – paper doll borders!
Make yourself a stencil before you begin cutting, that way all your borders will be the same shape and size. Cut strips of colored wrapping paper, and fold it back and forth for the entire length of the strip. Trace your stencil onto the top layer, then cut. Hang the connected paper dolls along the walls for a great looking border.
To paint a coordinating table cloth, sponge paint using a doll-shaped sponge onto a plain colored table cloth.
For plates and dinnerware, you may be able to purchase a commercially printed coordinate, but they could be tough to find. Buy nicely colored plates instead, set the table and top each one with a colored napkin with a single paper doll wrapped and taped together to make a paper doll napkin ring.
Activities
You have the kids there, you have the cake. What are you all to do now? With these suggestions and a little of your own creativity, the possibilities are truly endless.
Play Paper Dolls
Sounds obvious, but exceedingly appropriate. Set up a paper doll station. Give each girl a card stock doll and supply the table with plenty of scraps of fabric, yarn, glue, buttons, ribbon, beads, crayons, markers, and so forth. Packages of scrap booking paper are a great resource for colorful, fashionable prints for cutting clothing for the dolls. It would be helpful to have a few pre-cut stencils of dolls and clothing shapes for the girls to follow, too. Leave them to their creations, with only minor adult interruption.
You can do this with felt dolls and fabric pieces, too. The children would not need to glue the pieces together, necessarily. Party goers could make multiple outfits to change the dolls into. Felt pieces will cling to the felt on its own, and can be used to make any accessory from hair to jewels (much the same as felt-board stories at school).
Designate yourself or another adult as someone who can show the girls how to cut traditional, connected paper dolls.
Doll Cookies
This activity will feed your guests, too. Bake plain sugar cookies cut with a girl (or boy) cookie cutter. Set out tubes of frostings, decorator tips and candies. The children will love to decorate their own snacks without the restraint of what an adult think the cookie should look like.
Party Game
A Party Game might be nice, too. Cut a large doll out of cardboard or heavy butcher paper and make a game of pin the bow on the dolly. The rest is pretty self-explanatory.
A doll shaped or little girl piñata would be another fun way to pass the time.
Party Favors
There are so many possibilities. Necklaces, jewelry and the like…or make each girl her own paper doll kit to take home. Include brightly colored papers, a pair of children’s scissors, a doll stencil, glue stick, collage materials, or beads.
Sets of magnetic “paper” dolls are available, and giving each girl one of her own to take home would make the perfect favor. If you cannot find individual sets, buy a larger set of magnetic dolls and separate them for individual favors.
For another option, check out this article for directions for custom molding crayons with chocolate molds; choose a doll, girl, or dancer mold for an appropriate fit.
~~A paper doll birthday party is a fun, girl-oriented theme that could be used for a birthday party for a large age range, from first birthday through elementary school. It is a nostalgic alternative that will save you money, and let your daughter’s day stand out as unique from the rest of the princess and movie-girl diva parties this year.
Reference:
- www.opdag.com ‘History of Paper Dolls’ www.orientaltrading.com inexpensive paper doll sets for party favors www.fbnr.com paper doll party cake
