Budget Birthday party for 8 year old girl??

[Minnie M6]

Here are some fun games/activities from parties when I was younger.

Get 2 decks of cards and a few wrapped gifts. Hand out all the cards from one deck (you might want to make the deck smaller as there aren't so many kids). Then a parent holds the other deck and starts reading them out, as the children make a match they take a present from the middle of the circle. You continue untill all the gifts are taken and then the kids can start taking from each other. When the game is over the kids unwrap the presents.

A little bit before the kids go home put on a movie and then have a bag with many different colored popcorn bags inside, each attached to a ribbon/string. Have the string sticking out and let each child pull out a bag of popcorn. You could change this to bags of chips or some other treat.

Oh my gosh- the first game you described is a tradition in our family at holidays! We never had a name for it---always just called it "The Game"
as in "are we playing the game at Aunt Sarah's party next week?" Everyone knows what game we mean
When you play with kids do they have a hard time with the taking gifts from each other part? SIL always makes you feel terrible for taking her goodies! We play with unwrapped items though- I like the idea of wrapping them so you don't know what you've got until the game's over.

 

[Minnie M6]

You could teach them to make friendship bracelets during your party too. Or friendship pins (anyone remember those little safety pins with the color coded beads on them that you'd wear on your tennies?) Am I showing my age?

I totally remember wearing friendship pins on my Tretorns
I don't know that I remember how to make them though.......

 

[Minnie M6]

We did a tie dye party one year, and it was a blast! The kids loved dying their own shirts. Instead of a cake, we had cupcakes and the bakery did the icing to look like tie dye. If you do this, make sure you tell the girls ahead of time to wear old clothes. Buy extra gloves for the girls to wear, too.

I like the tie dye cupcake idea!
Yes, old clothes would be a good idea for this type of party!

 

[Minnie M6]

Is your DD into the American Girl stuff? When DD turned 8, I bought a Samantha Mystery game for $15.00. The girls had so much fun running around the house solving the mystery. I made cupcakes instead of a big cake and the girls frosted/decorated them. Instead of goody bags full of junk, I bought each girl an AG crossword puzzle book (got a great deal on them at Overstock.com).

This year, DD just turned 9. I let her pick 3 friends and I took them to see the Kit movie. After the movie, we had cake at our house. I bought each girl a Kit book for a party favor. They all had a great time.

She loves AG! We haven't played the Mystery game........it sounds like so much fun! I'll check it out...

 

[Minnie M6]

For my daughter's 7th party, I had it in the basement. I bought one of those helium balloon tanks for $20 from Walmart and blew up a bunch of balloons to fill the room.

The kids had a ball...chasing, swatting, catching, doing races with the balloons.
We also played the typical party games like:
Musical Chairs
Pass the Present
Egg Race
Duck Duck Goose

Very cheap and they had a great time.

I didn't know you could buy your own helium tank- sounds like they had fun!

 

[eeyorefan74]

The American Girl mystery games that a PP mentioned are on sale at the American Girl website for $7 each- Kit, Samantha, and Molly. I just ordered one for DD's 8th birthday party next year. I don't think her friends can all read well enough to try it this year, but it looks like fun.

 

[mjkacmom]

When dd was 8, we had a campout in the backyard from 6 - 10. The girls brought jammies and changed in tents we set up, we had a bbq, had a campfire and smores, had a treasure hunt and some other games. I gave out dollar store flashlights for the favor. Edited to add that DH brought home the projector from work, and we set up a sheet on the shed, and had an outdoor movie with popcorn!

One of her friends had a breakfast party - the girls came over in their jammies at 9 am - very cute!

 

[StillPinballFamily]

I like the tie dye cupcake idea!
Yes, old clothes would be a good idea for this type of party!

We've done two tie-dye b-day parties - and here are two ideas we've used for your own homemade cupcakes/cakes.

1. Get three tubes of the gel type of icing - in colors you like - we used yellow, blue, red. Have/make/buy white frosted cupcakes. In the center of each cupcake, draw an outline of a small circle of one color icing in the center (like the size of a dime), a slightly larger one around it with another color (nickel-sized), and a slightly larger one (quarter-sized) with the last color.

Take a toothpick and draw lines out from the cupdake center through all three icing lines - sort of like a starburst. Clean the toothpick off on a napkin after each pass. The colors blend and mix and look really cool!

2. Start with plain white frosted cupcakes or even a cake. (We had a t-shirt shaped cake pan, but you could also just cut a shirt shaped cake out of any cake rectangle.) Use your Michaels/AC Moore 40% off coupons for the Wilton spray on food coloring - without coupons, I think it is $3 a can. Choose whatever colors you want - only need two or three (and the stuff keeps forever!). Start with the lightest color and just spray onto the icing - layer the colors and they blend beautifully. If the kids are old enough, they could even spray their own.

Sorry I don't have digital photos to post (these parties were some time ago), but both ideas are easy-peasy - and better yet - cheap and fun. My kids still talk about the tie-dye cupcakes!

P.S. If you do a bead party, the 40% off coupons are GREAT for buying your own beads and supplies. Sometimes, the craft stores even have 50% ones! Good luck!

 

[thing#2]

Haven't seen this idea here yet: by my sisters and i always had home parties (they're more fun).. my parents didn't want sleepovers, but we still had fun..

when we were younger, we divided the house into sections by room like: DANCE room, MOVIE room, SNACK room (kitchen), and then CRAFT room...

Usually we got a couple new CD's and Movie's the night before our party as some of our presents to use for the party..

and in the craft room: once my mom asked my school for a giant roll of paper that they had extra.. Ya know, those ones in the resource rooms that have to be hung up and you rip off for how much you need... teachers use it to cover walls at my school.. anyway, they always have lots of it and the school loves my mom for some reason.. we just put that on the floor, unrolled it and put crayons, markers, and glitter pens all over to decorate.. then we hung them in our rooms afterwards... so much fun..

 

[zazu1971]

What about a tea party?

 

[luckey-lasvegas]

Check with your library for party books. My DD is having an end of summer pool party next week and we got lots of ideas from books we found at the library. The American Girl Magazine always has a lot of cute ideas for differn't parties. Family Fun is another great site. The Family Fun this month has cute craft ideas using buttons. The kids could make button rings, hair clips, pony tail bands and bracelets, decorate picture frames with buttons all around and take a picture of each girl "cute as a button" to put in them. You could decorate a round cake with royal icing buttons. For food you could cut round sandwhiches , melt cheese in between two Ritz crakers, have wagon wheel macaroni salad. For games you could play Twister, or some kind of a button toss game.
We did a glamour party for DD's 8th birthday too. I had two teenage girls from our skating rink (DD is a skater)come and do the girls hair amd make up, my mom did their nails, I hung a piece of fabric in the hall and took the girls picture with my digital camera. DH went and printed the pictures while the girls decorated picture frames. Each girl went home with their picture in a frame looking fabulous!

Have Fun!

 

[Minnie M6]

You guys have shared so many great ideas it is tough to settle on one! I have shared many of them with DD and she likes a lot of them as well. I really appreciate the heads up about the sale on the AG Mystery Game- I am leaning toward ordering the Kit game. I was thinking we could combine the jewelry making idea with the game- like they could make necklaces afterward since the game is all about finding a necklace. And if the Kit movie is released on DVD by then we could also watch it. I also love all the tie dye ideas and the campout in the yard....the button crafts sound fun....

Thanks for all the great tips!

 

[triplet_mom_2001]

I haven't read all the responses so this may be a repeat. How about an "almost sleepover"? My kids have been to a couple and had a great time. The parties consist of kids coming over and bringing pjs and slippers. Start with snack foods or hotdogs. Let the kids do a quick craft. Change into pjs, put on a movie, pop some popcorn and let the kids enjoy the movie. Parents pick up once the movie is over.

Lisa

 

[MrandMissVacation]

I"m planning my daughter's 9th birthday party as we speak/type.
She loved the "I survived a Japanese Game show" tv show, so I planned some activities/games around that. We are having games/cake/ice cream sundae bar
We will divided the kids into two teams (I will probably make stickers for them to wear on their backs to represent which team they are on using the computer/printer)
Game 1: Water relay, each team member will wear a silly rubber hat and animal floaty around their torso and take a big sponge, get it wet, and run across the yard to fill the container, run back to pass off the 'costume' to the next team mate until everyone has had a turn.
Game 2: Wearing cowboy had/ bandana use velcro ping-pong balls to aim at target. Same as game before.. change costumes and next team member has a turn at the target for points
Game 3: water balloon toss.. easy and fun

Most items are available around the house or dollar store.

This is our first party like this, in the past we have always catered to the parents (meaning I cook like crazy to serve a real meal to everyone, try to entertain the kids, rush through cake/ice cream/presents). I"m SO done with that. No meal prep for me. I'll set out snack foods, but otherwise it's just a fun afternoon playing with the kids. arty:

 

[ravensite]

Making hemp bracelets are simple and real fun. You can do it during a long journey in order to break the boredom. Just learn the basic knots with twine and beads and this would help you to pass the time and personalize your creativity and style.
Prior to understanding how to make hemp bracelets, it is essential to know how to prepare the hemp.
Purchase Hemp Twine from Amazon. For making bracelets 1mm thick natural color hemp is advisable.
After learning the technique of putting the various types of knots try different colors and thickness of hemp.
Measure the size of any old bracelet and take six times the length of that measurement.
Take the second strand, which is twice the length of the first strand.
Fold both the strands at the midpoint and put the knot leaving ½ to ¾ inch long from the end. howtomakehempbracelets.net/

 

[MichelleinMaine]

We made beadie buddies (animal keychains/backpack clips from pony beads) at VBS the other day and it was a HUGE hit with all the kids. (Best done with probably age 6+ because of the difficulty.) My 8yo has been making them for 2 days straight.

Just need alot of pony beads and gimp/string. They were on sale at AC Moore a couple weeks ago for $1.50, but could use 40% off coupons too.
I put a dot of super glue over the knots if using gimp. It doesn't always stay tied.

 

[zoemurr]

so if this was mentioned I'm sorry.

My DD just turned 10 and we had 4 girls over for a treasure hunt. I only really used supplies I had around the house. It was very involved and ended up taking them over 2hrs to do. (I can send you details if you want). For the "treasure" I ordered oysters that had pearls in them that the girls had to crack open, and they came with a chain. (About $8 each from ebay I think). I made a treasure chest cake which was very easy out of a loaf pan. (I think it was from familyfun.com. So, whole thing was under $60 and the girls had a great time.

Now my son wants the same thing.. but finding a "cool" treasure for boys is not as easy.

 

[MELSMICE]

A few years ago we did a 'Glamour Girls' party. My nieces & my mom were the 'beauty assistants' who put on nail polish, lip gloss and hair & body glitter. It wasn't that much for the stuff & I even bought some cheap craft kits for them to do as well (the foam ones that come in a bucket & you can make 30). Most of the goodie bag stuff came from the Target Dollar Spot when it was 75% off. It was a lot of fun & I think everyone had a really good time.

This is what I was going to mention. When my oldest DD turned 9 (many years ago ) we had a Glamour Girls party. We did hair & nails. My mom & sister came over to help.

We had all kinds of things going - hot rollers, curling irons, hairspray, etc. They did the hair, I did the nails. The girls loved it.

 

[MELSMICE]

I just realized this thread is over a year old. Was someone else in need of ideas?

 

[mrsboz]

My daughter is turning nine. We are in the midst of planning a party. Ideas are definitely needed.