Girls Just Wanna Have Fun
Tanya Santos wanted her girls, Leila Jolie, 2, and Marieah, 9, to celebrate their birthday together.  And she came up with a clever – and very girly – way to do it with a “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” party theme.   Starting with the invitations, Santos baked cupcakes, took photos of the invites and photo-shopped them into adorable mailers that let guests know what would be in store at this party.
When guests arrived, they found a backyard set with hot pink and black decorations. Photos of the birthday girls had been placed throughout the tablescape in hot pink frames. Black gerbera daisies were placed in clear vases, and scattered throughout were high-heel and princess wand sugar cookies, plus little tank tops and shorts packaged as cupcakes and ice cream cones.
 But hungry guests had plenty of other things to eat, including veggie and meat trays, popcorn chicken in popcorn boxes, true-blue popcorn from a popcorn machine, and there was even an old-fashioned soda bar and pink lemonade. 
For entertainment, all the girls decorated posters and foam door stoppers and other shaped foam objects.  A bounce house provided lots of other fun.   Guests left with goody bags stuffed with hot pink necklaces, a cookie with a thank-you tag attached and a tank or short “ice cream cone” or “cupcake.”
Santos says the cupcakes she made were a hit—no leftovers. Next time, she may skip the cake and let the guests decorate their own cupcakes.  That would save her work and add another great party activity for the guests.

Gone Fishing
Gloria Barrera’s son Andrew loves to fish.  So what better party theme than a fishing party for Andrew’s seventh birthday celebration?  To get the party started, mother and son created adorable fish invitations from scratch.   They made a fish on the computer, enlarged it, printed it out and cut it, adding the party details.  For an added touch, they attached little fishing poles made from cut bamboo and added a tiny hook to each.  There was no question what party this would be when guests received the invites. 
But it was even clearer when guests arrived: the setting, says Barrera, was at a kid-friendly fishing dock at a local beach.  With that kind of natural scene, who needs decorations?  Still, she set out fish-shaped balloons and created lots of fish cutouts to label the party food, which consisted of cold pasta salad with chicken and vegetarian and turkey wraps.  Plastic cups also had little fish labels on them, so everyone could reuse them easily. 

Activities included a few games, a fish piñata and—fishing.  Guests were supplied with fishing poles and bait, and they spent hours just catching fish (parents were included in the fun). But the fishing didn’t end once the party was over.  Instead, guests were given goody bags that were little tin pails.  Each one was labeled “Gone fishing, Andrew’s Seventh Birthday.”  Inside were Swedish fish candies, a little red bobber, fish tattoos, wooden hand-fishing poles and tons of other fish-themed items, some of which were donated by the non-profit IFishNY.org. 

Barrera says it was surprising how much fun everyone had just fishing and enjoying nature; no other entertainment necessary. 
   
Claudia Gryvatz Copquin is associate editor of Long Island Parent magazine.