Wednesday, January 9, 2013

Games

I had planned lots of car-related games but we ended up playing like one. So if you also are planning a party for your kid that's turning 2 I wouldn't worry about the games as children enjoy non structured ones. Arrange some hot wheels on a rug for playing, I know reef liked this! Setup a crafting table where the guests can:
  • paint wooden cars with kid-friendly paint and markers (they can take them home in the end)
  • dip Hotwheels into poster paint and roll them on their own sheet of paper or canvas
Red light,Green light
A great game for ages 4 and up is Red light,Green light the rules of which follow.
One person is designated as 'it' and plays the part of the stop light. The other kids line up about 20 feet away from 'it'. Facing away from the other kids, 'it'calls out 'Green light!' The other kids move toward  'it' .'It' then calls out “Red light!” and turns around quickly. Any of the kids who are caught moving must go back to the start line. Play continues until someone reaches and tags 'it' That person then becomes  'it' The trick to winning this game is to move smoothly so that you can freeze instantly until you are within reach of 'it'.

Obstacle course
Build an obstacle course in your backyard, using empty cardboard boxes, old tires, traffic cones and anything else you can find. Divide the kids up into equal groups and give each team a tire. The teams have to push, pull and wheel the tires around the obstacle course as fast as possible. The winning team is the first that gets across the finish line.

Pin the wheel on the car
A car themed version of 'Pin the tail on the donkey'. Fun. Easy.




Food & Beverages

I kept the food pretty simple. You'll wanna try to serve simple things that kids like. Don't go out of your way to make something gourmet,they probably won't like it and definetly won't appreciate your efforts. I served potato chips (normal and sour onion),ice cream (vanilla and cookies & cream),smores and of course,cake. As I said earlier there wasn't much time to plan the party so I ended up getting a plain cake from BJs and having them write 'Happy birthday Reef' on it. There's nothing wrong with this but if you really wanna highlight the theme you can buy or make a car cake. For the latter option you can shape the cake yourself or buy a car shaped pan online.
To drink I got V8 tropical punch and Lipton green tea which were much enjoyed by my 2 year old nephew so I see no reason other kids wouldn't like it also.
I found this super easy idea on another blog too: fill two clear jugs/coolers with lemonade and iced tea and label the lemonade as 'water tower' and the tea as 'diesel fuel'. The result should look like this.

Invitations

For invitations,I found several cute car themed ideas. I concentrated on the party itself since I had little time to plan the party but for the craftier people out there here is an idea that fits the car theme.
These traffic light invitations are simple to make AND cute! Simply cut out red,yellow and green circles and glue them to a black rectangle. Glue this final result to a sheet of any color construction paper. The party info can be written directly on the back or you can print papers with the details and glue them.








A similar invitation can be made like this:

But of course you don't have to necessarily MAKE your invitations. You can find several websites with car themed templates to use. Making invitations on Windows Office,Powerpoint etcetera can also be very easy. If you live near a party store this is great too. I also saw simple invitations at Walmart and Target.
If none of these ideas work for you guys,I recommend ordering from the following websites.
http://www.tinyprints.com/shop/cars--birthday-party-invitations.htm?cid=SEM-TP-Google

http://www.shutterfly.com/cards-stationery/birthday-invitations/boy-birthday-invitations?categoryCode=60498







So my 2 year old nephew Reef came to visit with my sister and since they were leaving on his birthday I decided to throw him an early party the day before. As most 2 year old boys he likes airplanes,cars and balls. I decided to go with a car themed party.There weren't any kids because they were visiting but he had fun with just his family.