3 year olds party with older children - help!

[Natasha198]

This feels like such a stupid question but I'm a FTM with little experience of children's parties, so bear with me!! I want to do a party for my son in the summer, but there will be a mix of ages from 2-10 years old. If we do the party at a hall, I'm not sure what to hire. I don't want to get a bouncy castle (did that for his 1st), what will entertain such a large age range?! Or am I overthinking it?

For my son I was thinking of hiring ride on cars (the electric ones) or Little City but both seem too young for the older kids. Thanks!!

If the hall is big enough, you could arrange a few activities. A crafts table is one older kids enjoy (decorate a cookie, colouring). Balls and hoops can also occupy older kids, or some games like parcel the parcel, or pin the tail on the donkey. I wouldn’t rule out a bouncy castle, if it would fit in the hall and is in your budget. It would keep the bigger kids separated from the younger ones for a big chunk of the party and doesn’t require you to organise much to entertain them. Also some bouncy castle hire places also rent out soft play bits/ride ons etc, so that the toddlers would have suitable things to entertain them.

Alternatively, you could rent out soft play bits/ride ons for the little kids and then some wiggle cars and giant games (like connect 4) for the older kids.

My main advice would be that you try to keep areas separate to some extent and that the things to entertain the older kids aren’t a danger to the younger ones (e.g. where older kids would be racing about and potentially knocking into younger kids).

I did this last year, and will repeat this year, for the same age range.

The hall I use had a playgroup with LOTS of toys, so I hire them, and the bouncy castle. Few craft bits (just colouring last year) wirh lots of pens and pencils and let them got in with it. The older kids had fun having an excuse to play on the baby toys. What I won't do again is pass the parcel. It took forever and they lost interest pretty quickly.