NOW CLOSED: Tell Chad Valley your best children's party tips - you could win a £100 Argos voucher!

[NewGirlHelenMumsnet]

What has gone down spectacularly well at a children's party you've organised - and what flopped? What great things have you envied seen at parties you've been to with your child, or that other people have told you about?

So tips on games, party food, birthday cakes, best/worst themes, party bags, presents, places to go/avoid - we want your children's party know-how.

Add your tips to this thread and one winner will get an Argos voucher for £100.

We'll use a selection of your tips on an upcoming Chad Valley hub [technical speak] on Mumsnet.

Many thanks
MNHQ

Facepainting for sure, learn how to do 2 things (butterflies and spiderman) so you can knock them out in a couple of minutes each.

Have something to do when the children arrive in dribs and drabs, one year I had cheapy fabric bags and gave the fabric pens to draw on them as they arrived, then they got to take them home.

NEVER give whistles or blowers out unless you want to either a) go mad or b) lose all your parent friends.
Ditto glitter

Make a playlist of songs beforehand, I alternate childrens songs with pop music and stream it through the xbox then for pass the parcel etc all I have to do is press pause on the remote.

Or, hire a bouncy castle at the local leisure centre. It normally only lasts an hour, knackers them all out, and no food allowed, so all you provide is drinks for the kids and cake. Done.

provide wine for the other parents. Especially when the kids are under 7. The noise they generate is unbelievable.
Outsource as much as you can . Get the date and time put in your dh's diary/blackberry so there can be no excuse for him not to turn up "Didn't know when it was " etc etc etc.
Bring loads of blackbin liners and kitchen roll.

I would second the soft play centre - we ended up spending less than all our friends and had much less work to do.

Failing that, fun party bags have included seeds in a pot and a bag of soil.

I've also bought big sets of books at much cheaper prices than if buying one or two and used them rather than too much over priced tat. Not that I'm saying the children prefer books over tat!!!!

hired a bouncy castle for our garden, comes complete with rain cover, both ds and dd birthdays in the summer, last year we had a fancy dress theme where everyone had to dress up inc adults - was v funny and families tended to come in themes which was nice, the pirate family even had a massive jolly roger flying from their car this year oour theme is royal so everyone will be making a crown to take home.
bbq for foos, sausages and burgers, and lots of old fashioned games, make sure music all sorted out ready to be loud enough in garden..
I pick a girls prize and a boys prize for pass parcels, send 2 parcels round in opposite directions if a big group of kids.. with a sweet in between layers to keep everyone iinterested, 1 layer per kid is perfect. my two love musical bumps/ statues so plenty of thet, then an adult dance competiton, birthday kid judges. !!! yes serve grannies plenty of wine to help things stay fun for all tee hee.
plenty of binliners, and the bouncy castle people help get rid of everyone as they arrive on dot of 6pm and deflate. cue hometime, with either a party bag or just a helium balloon. job done.

I agree with the soft play centre. I have hosted two parties now. The soft play was less stressful!

The best games we've played at a children's party are:

The mummy game - divide the children into teams and one person in each team has to be wrapped up in toilet paper. The first team to completely cover their mummy in tissue wins. It helps to have an adult helper in each team if they are young.

Pictionary - we used a large pad resting on an easel. I printed off some words of things that were easy to draw (with younger children you can also use a picture) ie toothbrush, TV. The birthday child started and then the correct guesser gets to have the next turn. If the same person guesses all the time, you might have to start choosing who gets to go next. We play it at the end of the party and it gets them sitting down and fairly relaxed.

Picnic boxes are good for the food. I've also used paper bags which are a lot cheaper!

Find the hidden treasure is a great game if you are lucky to be able to get outside.

Wrap all the things you have got for the party bags and "decorate" a treasure chest (mine was a plastic box with a skull and crossbones drawn on). Hide everything round the garden. When the kids find it they put it in the treasure chest and at the end of the party get to pick, say, 2 things from the treasure chest.

Means the money you spent on the party bag things gets put to good use. Can keep them going for quite a while too.

Other good game is the "Hats game". Just like musical bumps but everyone has to put on a hat - with one dissapearing each time. MUCH easier to judge than musical statues which has to be the worst party game ever - so hard on the host!

Never, ever attempt Pass the Parcel with the under 4s. Never have two parcels/two circles. The parcels go out of sync and you can't time it so both parcels land on people who haven't yet had it.

And NEVER do a layer for everyone. Keep it short and sweet. It's much easier to remember who's already had it and it saves many arguments if there are lots of children who don't get it. At the end, tell them they've got 30 seconds to get as much wrapping paper in the bin as they can and put some really fast music on.

Don't have a prize for the best fancy dress. It is impossible to decide whose princess dress is better more expensive

If you aren't having the party at home, do not get a pinata. Especially do not get one then expect the party host to hold it on a broomstick

1. Make all the food vegetarian and simple - ie plate of veggie hotdogs in buns with ketchup and one without ketchup. Huge bowl of curly fries. Less choice = less waste

1. We had a village fete party outside - stalls with name the teddy etc and hook a duck. made a sponge throwing thing for dh to put his head thro.

1. Local ice cream man came round, paid him £1 per child and gave them all pirate gold to pay with. Much cheaper than hiring a professional party ice cream van.

1. Forget about 'owing' invites - if you can only have 5 kids, you end up filling the spaces with the ones who've had whoe class parties.

1. Sticky labels and black felt tip pen are essential - label the drinks, prizes etc.

A small group of five year olds tend to just play together and not be that fussed about the party games as long as there is party food and a cake!

My DH did a Crystal Maze theme party for his oldest DS, which has gone down in history :o - they still talk about it over 10 years later!

He did four zones with different activities (puzzles, target shooting etc) then had a big ballpit which the DCs went in to try and find cardboard stars.

I haven't read the whole thread so my tip may have already been mentioned.

When doing pass the parcel, we wrap a party hat between the layers so when a child wins, they put their hat on and its very easy to make sure every child gets a turn to upwrap a layer.

Another tip, if you have a pinata, make sure its tied up really well and that everyone stands well back. Its also not a good idea to tie it too close to a wall as we once found out!

I did a big picnic party for 5 years olds and it was great. a couple of sun tents with sandwiches, cakes etc and a great way to get to know all the new mums at school.

Also if having a party at home, can never go wrong with a chocolate fountain!!!

Spice up musical bumps by setting challenges when they bump down like don't let ur bum/feet/hands etc touch the floor

Instead of pass the parcel at our 3 year old DS's party in Jan we had a lucky dip. No tears and no stress!

We did food for the adults as well as the kids and made sure there was a place for them to sit and relax while the kids played on the bouncy castle and plasma cars.

Don't feel pressurised to conform to the 'whole class in a hired venue' thing. Invite a few children for a small tea party in the house; much less stress, far fewer presents to find a home for, and far cheaper!

Ask your child what they want. Ds wanted pot noodles (usually a forbidden treat) so we made 20 pot noodles. Apparently this made the party legendary among his friends. You can't hope to fathom the mind of an eight year old.

I have only held parties for a young child, so my best tip is don't bother with party games for under 4/5s. I recommend a craft table, tent/ball pool set up, and a gazebo with toys in it. Well, if it's the summer, anyway. Oh, and jam and cream cheese sandwiches.

As ever, I love the number of completely contradictory tips on here...

Re pass the parcel - for every eight kids have one more parcel to stop it lasting twelve hours and everyone wandering off.

put either favours, sweets or forfeits inside balloons. let kids play. when balloon is popped, they get a surprise! little packets of haribo great for 5 and under, forfeits work well for older kids as gives everyone a giggle as they try to do a handstand/grab a blue sock from someone else/run round the garden 10 times etc etc.

see - cases in point - wmmc - there is another post saying don't do multiple parcels (I am with you, FWIW) and toomuchmonth's wonderful party game would have my DD running for the hills as she loathes balloons popping...

top tip: you can't win. Someone will disagree with whatever you decide to do. Accept that before you start and save yourself a lot of stress.

I think this might have come from a Mumsnetter originally but...

To solve the problem of non-RSVPers, don't mention the venue on the invitation. If the child wants to come, the parents have to get in touch.

DD's best ever was a spy party. The five of them decorated T-shirts (fabric pens plus cheap tops from Primark) then put on fake glasses, noses & moustaches & had to solve a series of clues using the code from Club Penguin, which finally led to a picnic & pinata in the nearby park.

Helium balloons instead of party bags always a massive hit with mine