Ideas for 8 year old girl at home party

[BalloonsAndBicycles]

Money is a bit tight this year but DD still would like a party so I am going to brave it and try and persuade her to have a party at home.

I think we'll probably have around 6-8 girls in total (drop off, no parents) and do it to coincide with an early tea - maybe 2.30-5.30 , something like that.

I would like ideas to keep them entertained and not tearing around the house (they can a bit, but the house isn't huge so it will get a bit crazy).I thought I could buy them each a pottery painting kit, from the works or similar, which doubles as take home gift.

But what else? Maybe bracelet/ loom band making? Glitter tattoos perhaps. I'm aware this is all very stereotypical "girl" ideas. Can someone think of less gendered ideas?

For games: I think pass the parcel etc are probably too babyish now? But maybe some other games would work well. DD isn't too keen on dancing so musical statues etc wouldn't go down that well with her.

Just starting to think about it now, so I can present these ideas as a fun cheaper alternative than the usual expensive party venues!

I once made lip balms at a party. They were mad for it.

Massive tub of Vaseline.
Small containers from B&M or similar
Gel food colouring
Cake flavourings (vanilla, cherry, mint etc)
I also had very fine glitter as it was the days before glitter was seen as the devils own work.

I've also done T-shirts with fabric pens. The trick there was to get them to design it first on a template.

You could roll with the early tea theme and do a tea party, but a 'grown up' one? So, pick a theme. If she likes Taylor Swift then have some sunglasses by the door, dress code is sparkles, or you could do a 'posh' tea party theme and have long gloves, bead necklaces and the likes at the door for when they come in to put on. Tea is things like little sandwiches arranged on cake stands (charity shops often have these for next to nothing!), little scones, little cakes, teapots and teacups (again, charity shop, and can be filled with different things like squash, they don't have to be tea!). They could each decorate a cupcake, and then move on to pottery painting or bracelet making.

You could also do a great british bakeoff theme, so divide them up into teams, give them each a store bought plain sponge and either some premade icing or the ingredients to make icing, and various things to decorate with. Set a theme and give them half an hour (set a timer) and then you come in and judge who the winner is.

Fairy Cake decorating? Baker Ross have good craft kits. We found that took up about 40 minutes.
When we did a party at home I kept them all downstairs which was better and kept it more controlled

I would have lots and lots of games ready - simple ones with any equipment or instructions ready so you can just pull them down and go. Some will last ages, some about two minutes.

At that age I'd try -
-Kim's game: basically a big tray of random objects (about 15) and a covering cloth. They get a minute to look at the objects, then they're covered, they look away, you remove one and they have to guess which one went. Repeat until there's only 3 objects.

• Musical chairs (cushions?) Fun at any age
• Consequences

I'd say General Post but I can't remember the rules, maybe Google it? It was always chaos and a lot of fun

• treasure hunt with clues - a lot of work but good fun

General.Post rules If you scroll down to the only comment that is how we used to play it.

I agree that one main craft is the way forward. Bedazzling a t shirt, pottery, making balms etc. We also have done "bingo" or a quiz with a theme - eg taylor swift or Halloween or their favourite tv show.

Accept a certain amount of charging round the house being a little loony but aim to.keep "free play" in manageable chunks of 15 minutes eg arrive and 15 minutes of charging around. The activity. 15 minutes charging around. Then back for quiz/bingo. Fee minutes charging around then food.

Also at home I have learnt the value of leaving some snacks and drinks out. Usually we have some fruit skewers or bowls of fruit, crisps, babybels, sausage rolls and small bottles of water or juice boxes.

Pizza making
Cinema party
Cupcake decorating
Iron on T-shirt embellishments
Make a music video
Learn a dance (use YouTube videos)

Ready steady cook, in two teams? Make a dip, make a pizza, make a cake - bake the cake while they're eating and everyone eats a slice warm 😋

I got some teddy bear making kits one year, a knockoff build-a-bear.

Pizza and a movie? Sleepover?

Those ideas sound really good op....my DD would have loved pottery painting and bracelet making.

They could also decorate cupcakes to take home with them...or make pizzas to eat at yours.

Oh and there's a party game where you have to put on gloves, a hat and a scarf and eat chocolate with a knife and fork...I can't remember what it was called but it's good fun

• make your own pizza
• cookie baking (cheap and they can take them home)
• movie night w popcorn
• treasure hunt in the garden

The chocolate game (in a circle, take in turns to role a dice, if you get a six you have to put on hat scarf gloves then use knife and fork to eat mars bar, til someone else roles a six and it’s their turn to try …)

check out all the minute to win it games. Loads of great ideas. Mine enjoyed one with straws and skittles and having to sort colours into plates. But don’t make them compete against each other (unless they’ve got the maturity). Make them be a team and if the team wins they all get a prize …

and a treasure hunt with clues ??

The chocolate game is a great one for that age - basically big bar of chocolate on plate in middle, knife and fork on the plate, you roll dice, if you roll a 6 you have to put on hat, scarf, gloves and then can try to cut up the chocolate with the knife and fork and then can eat until next person rolls a 6.

If you can tolerate a bit of mess - the flour game is great fun. www.thechaosandtheclutter.com/archives/the-flour-game

As per others suggestions - We did bake off for a party with DSD at similar age that they loved - we even dressed up as Paul and Mary to judge it!

If you want to get them out and about for a bit of it a treasure hunt around the local area can be fun - I did one recently for DD 9 year - I wrote the clues in spy pens so they had to use uv pen to read and there was a challenge on each to complete.

@StillTryingToKeepGoing - you're kinder than me - we use cadbury chocolate bars as harder for them to get the chocolate! 😁

Start gathering random items of clothing and accessories (dresses, dad’s old PJs, feather boas, hats, parts of old dressing up outfits etc) in 2 sacks. Girls split into 2 teams in separate rooms. Make each team pick a chosen ‘look’ from a hat eg pop star, someone’s dad, your teacher etc etc) each team have five mins ( set loud timer on Alexa/ cooker/ iPad) to dress up one of their team to that theme. You judge which is best.

Sorry - just seem someone above suggested the following too!!) Mars bar game. Tray placed in middle large circle of girls. Mars bar or large cake of chocolate in wrapper placed on tray with knife and fork. Hat, gloves and scarf in middle beside tray. Dice passed round circle to each kid in turn. Kid who throws a six rushes into middle , has to put scarf, gloves and hat on pre trying to cut a slice of the confectionery all before next kid throws a six. If another kid throws a six when another kid already in middle, kid in middle must stop immediately and take hat etc off so new kid tries to get a turn at choc pre next six etc etc. Mass hilarity

Sheets of paper. Each kid draws a head at top sheet with neck. Kid folds over paper concealing head leaving wee bit of neck showing. Passes to next kid - now all draw a tummy and start of legs - fold over and pass on ; now all draw legs and feet ; fold and pass on - then kids write in a name of a person e.g. a teacher or another kid at party or name of boy they hate/ love at school etc. Fold over and pass on - last thing each kid unwraps the likeness of the named person….

Good luck. .

I bought bird boxes from baker Ross which they painted, that was their take home (with a pack of sweets),

I had them make pizzas, make a big batch of dough in advance (6 cups bread flour, 2 tbsp oil, 3 tsp sugar, 1 tsp salt, 2 sachets yeast and water to make the dough will make plenty, it's 2 batches if you have a bread maker), buy pasata, grated cheese, slice veggies, pepperoni perhaps. Give each dough and greaseproof paper, stretch it out and then they make the pizzas which becomes the food.

For my DDs 8th I did Afternoon Tea at The (my road name). Sounded like a boutique hotel - and based invitations around that. We had a lovely tea set (with lemonade in the teapot!), cupcakes, and sandwiches etc, and sat them all around our dining table. Then we went Roller skating - but some of the ideas here are really great. So much fun. I wish I could do it again but she's 16.

Could also do tie-dye T shirts or tote bags. It can develop whilst you have tea then go in the wash while you play some games after tea.

We recently did a Harry Potter 9th birthday party. I bought a potion kit online, they all absolutely loved that. And they took the cauldrons, wands and certificates home along with a slice of cake.

Everything else was either borrowed, free from local Facebook groups or very cheap from Vinted. There's so much HP stuff around.

biscuit decorating. - icing, sprinkles, sweets.

diy pizza- either make the dough and they stretch it out and put toppings on, or use premade pizza bases.

Can be done on your dining table.

If you think the Harry Potter potion idea would go down well, you can get ingredients very cheaply:

Red washing up liquid - dragon blood
Craft feathers - phoenix feathers
Glitter - serpent scales
White vinegar with food colour - manticore venom
Baking soda - pixie dust

The soda and vinegar will make it froth up very pleasingly (if messily).

No need for a special kit! Particularly if you have some old jars etc you can put the ingredients in.

Some great ideas here, thank you all!

I do like the Harry Potter craft idea and also a bird box rather than pottery is nice.

Now to sell it to DD, I think I can use quite a few of these ideas.

I did think about a sleepover and DD would love one but I couldn't cope with 8 girls sleeping over 😱 and I'd feel mean about excluding 5. Perhaps we'll do that another time.