The Birthday Party

We held Kiera's birthday party yesterday. Rather than do a "build-a-bear" at one of the expensive toy stores, we made our own felt bears and then had a tea party.

I had our neighbour's daughter come down and "work" with us for the party and she is such a treat. The kids loved her and she did a great job helping set everything up.

When the kids arrived, each kid had their own tea cup and saucer(purchased at Daiso for S$2.00 each) that they were allowed to decorate with Sharpies. After the cups were decorated to the satisfaction of the kids we moved onto bear making.

I spent the last weekend pre-sewing the edges of the bears getting them ready for stuffing and decorating. The kids were allowed to chose what ever clothing they wanted to use with lots of felt, scraps of fabric and ribbon I had laying around. I purchased around 5 packages of felt from Daiso (again everything is 2.00) and had enough felt to make 12 bears and plenty of extras for the clothes. Also at Daiso I was able to purchase googly eyes and some lace and the kids had a blast decorating their bears in really unique ways.

The rest of the afternoon was rounded out with a proper tea party. The kids each had their own cups, we used "ice tea" in tea pots and served homemade whole wheat scones with whipped cream with fresh organic strawberries and organic raspberries. We also made proper tea sandwiches with chicken and cucumber, chicken salad and chicken and avocado. Jeff also made some ham sandwiches. When all of the food had been devoured by a hungry batch of kids, we finished off with a birthday cake and group pictures before an impromptu dance session in the area formerly known as our dining room (the table had moved to the patio for the party).

It was a great, if not exhausting day and beat the heck out of any $1000 party we would have had at one of the "kids games places" downtown. Total cost probably was around 300 when you included the cake, the food and all of the goodie bags. I just am very glad I have another 5 months before I have to plan Declan's!

Simple Birthday Parties

Birthday parties are big deals here in Singapore. particularly amoung the expat familys. This is really one of those keeping up with the Jones's type situations where for a starting fee of 500 bucks you can go to this children's gym and they will entertain the kids for 2 hours. Now you need to have a minimum of 25 kids, you get charged per head for each kid over the minimum and you are required to bring your own cake. Honestly, it is not just the money, it is the thought of all of the over consumption that takes place. My son doesn't need 25 presents. In fact, the 4 her got last night (2 from us and one from grandparents W&L and one from Nancy) are more than he needs. We have way too much stuff as it is!

So, I thought long and hard about birthdays. I want to make it meaningful, I want it to be fun and I want it to be manageable, from a cost as well as a consumption perspective. The solution. A home party.

A home party, with a jungle/Indiana Jones theme. I think we will do a scavanger hunt, water balloons game on the grass, snake decorations and a home made cake (A dinosaur), home made punch (with jelly worms) and a total invite list of 6 kids, plus our 2. Pizza will be ordered in (not the most healthful of foods, but hey.... it is a birthday afterall!)

Today I will go and get stuff for the goodie bags, and may try to get some stuff about Singapore's parks and wildlife. Will follow up with pictures!