Party time - 4/5 year olds

[SkyBlue1987]

Hi, I’m organising an upcoming birthday party in a play zone where we have hired out the play area for an hour, we then have an hour in the party room over lunch so providing a lunch spread and cake for the kids and something light for the adults to nibble on. Is a hour too long for food. Wondering if I should bring something for them to do - a craft or party game or just let the party finish earlier naturally if they are done eating within the hour. We won’t open gifts at the party - there’s too many kids it will be chaos.

An hour will be too long for food. I expect they’ll be done in 15 minutes. You could finish up with party games, pass the parcel, musical statues, but no one would would be upset if you just ended early. 1 hour of play though seems a bit short. I think 1.5 hours is a bit more standard for these things (then 30 minutes for food). But as long as people aren’t driving a long way to get there and likely to be late, I think it’s fine. Adults will be grateful to have some of their day back.

An hour is definitely too long for food, but pass the parcel, a couple rounds of musical statues, let them mess about with a bunch of balloons, and you'll soon fill the time.

Craft, depends on the children – DD1 had a craft-themed party for her 5th, but it was a relatively small invite list, and a group that would happily settle down to that sort of activity after some more active games.