Organising soft play party

[nonamemummy]

Never organised a party before. My son will be turning 4 and wants a soft play party. You can have up to 30 people there.
Do most of the kids you invite usually actually turn up?

Also they would provide food for £4 each child. Do you think I could do it cheaper/better sorting the food myself?

And party bags?! Where’s the best place to buy all the little bits for party bags. Or even some ideas of what to put in them?

Any advice welcome Thankyou!

just go with the soft plays food its much easier on you and most places wont allow you to bring your own food anyway apart from birthday cake. people can be quite rude with invites.Some wont tell you anything,some will reply last minute,some will tell you yes and not show up and some may even bring siblings thinking its free to bring them.

When you send invites make sure you say at bottom this invite is for one child only and please reply by date as i will not be accepting invites past this date.

Poundland sell bags,fillers and invites.Just pop one toy ,bubble mix,one sweetie and a slice of cake your good to go

alternatively more costly but more convenient

www.ebay.co.uk/itm/50-boys-girls-party-bag-toys-Birthday-loot-fillers-Pass-the-parcel-prizes/351658834437?hash=item51e07ffa05:g:7tMAAMXQDrJRy0fQ

www.amazon.co.uk/Unique-Party-95233-Bubbles-Fillers/dp/B00005BMAF/ref=sr_1_5?keywords=bubbles+24&tag=mumsnetforu03-21&qid=1582022624&sr=8-5

www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Party-Bags-5-100-Fairy-princess-pirate-farm-sea-pony-zoo-boy-girl-UK-SELLER/380462510741?hash=item5895553295:m:mu5evExRZ05a8y8O-tFQO6w

www.ebay.co.uk/itm/TONGUE-PAINTER-LOLLIES-X-30-RETRO-SWEETS-PARTY-BAGS-LOLLIPOPS-HALLOWEEN-SOUR/261025778517?epid=24021911688&hash=item3cc6594b55:g:EvwAAOSw1cNaBWn2

Wilko also great for party bag fillers, their alien hoppers were a favourite at our son's 4th birthday party!

At age 4, particularly if you're inviting lots of children, I'd say a good number but not all of them will turn up.
You will find a lot of people won't reply. Make sure you put an RSVP date on the invitation and be ruthless at chasing people down for an answer when it gets to that date.

If you've never organised a party before I'd let the soft play place sort the food, then all you need to worry about is cake and party bags. My top tip would be to remember to bring candles, a decent knife and a something to wrap the cake in to go home.

For party bags (again to make it easy) I'd be tempted to buy a multipack of books from somewhere like the Book People, then you just need to give everyone a book, some sweets and a piece of cake and you're sorted :)

It would be £140 for the food from soft play. Just seemed a lot as hiring out the soft play was only £100

seems about average for soft play ,it cost about that for my daughters one