Hi to everyone.
My DD's birthday party is coming up and she's really into horses. For some reason I've saved some large boxes and the packing material (mostly paper and the big bubble wrap). I keep thinking that I can use it for a coral or something for the kids to play with the horses. Little plastic horse figures. My problem is that I'm stunted with creative thinking. Right now I'm trying to keep the chaos in my head from spilling out. Up until this age, we've always celebrated with just us or a friend. Now that she's in preschool and she's aware of parties, it's a whole new world. So this is my first real birthday party. Believe it or not, I've kept the guest list from school to 4. That doesn't include family friends. You have to invite them. Instead of harassing my friends for their thoughts, I'm asking all of you.
Thanks in advance.
Thank you to all the moms for their ideas. I've decided to use the boxes and make them into wagons with pool noodles covered with the bubble wrap as the canopy. The wagons will have a few of my DDs horses to "pull" the wagon. Cross your fingers that it actually works.
There are barns all over... that will do parties.. or you can have ponies come to you... we just went to one here in HB and we have been to the Lakewood equestrian center. Or for free you can go walk thru them and have a litle field trip to the party. Most horse owners are around on the weekends are more than happy to teach kids about the horses and sometimes they let my son help feed and brush them. He loves it...
You could do the whole Cowgirl theme and include the horse. Have some trail mix instead of chips. The cake could have horses on them or you could do cupcakes w/ horse or cowboy hats. Look at some party websites and get an idea of what they have...you don't have to buy them but you may get some ideas (that is what I do for my girl). You could just use plain color-coordinated supplies with horse accents at the party.
Great ideas! I am a little bit from you but do horse birthday parties reasonably www.shamrocktranch.com
I also know of a gal who has a mini she does parties at your site with... cute as ever... she does tricks and everything... google Cheries Jubilee and her info will come up. Love the obstacle course/ jumping course idea... We do gymkhanas... games on horseback... weaving through poles and barrels etc. you can check out California gymkhana association http://calgymkhana.com/docs/rulesndocs/thirteenevents.pdf for patterns that are done on horseback.. the girls can "run" actual horse patterns... Good luck! C.
I think the coral idea is really cute! My sister did a horse theme for my niece in April. She dressed her up like a cowgirl, had a horse cake and hired a lady to do pony rides. It was a lot of fun!
Many years ago (my dd is 16 now) she was into horses too..her 5th birthday. She has a summer birthday so that worked for here in Minnesota. We had a bigger crew (10-12 if I remember..cousins and neighbor kids), and I paid a pony ride place who came to our home (suburban street) with a dwarf horse little dude, some petting zoo animals (a pair of bunny, pygmee goat, 2 kinds of chickens and?? something else?), plus the gals teen daughter who did GREAT face painting. So we had the kids in smaller groups, but all close to each other, and all were busy and not sitting in long lines in the heat.
My Mom and I had gone to the party and dollar stores and got cheap straw cowboy hats, sheriff badges and red bandana's for each child. We also made a simple..super simple..pattern for a vest (3 pieces...back panel and 2 front ones...we made them in general sizes to accomodate the age of children coming), and got some thin fakey vinyl type "cowhide" stuff at the fabric store. Each vest required a running stich line up each side and across each shoulder. No finishing on seams, etc as it was this vinyl stuff. So each child had a neck bandana, hat, vest with sheriff badge and looked the part!
We also got a few hay bales to decorate our area for pictures and to welcome the kids...no missing which house it was, and we just put them behind the shed and used again for Fall decorating and then to spread around plants for winter insulating.
Then we had gotten other bandana's in a variety of colors and made those the goodie bags..with a few candies, a few toy horses and such for them to take home. During the party we took pics of all the kids on the horse..and another of each one with the birthday girl next to the horse. When we sent THANK YOU's we sent copies of both of those pics to each child.
Good luck and have fun!
Call the Irvine Regional Park and see if they rent out their ponies (they do rides at the park). Go online and get cowboy hats and bandanas for all the kids. Draw a horse on a piece of poster board and have the kids pin the tail on the horse (use double sided tape and put the child's name on their "tail") or the bridle. Michael's has cute little wooden cut out horses that the kids can decorate and color. Also you can get a hobby horse head and set it up for the kids to throw a lasso around as a game.
Have fun!
Get cheep horse posters and place them on the sides of the 'corral'. Cheap cowboy/girl hats that you can get a oriental trading. Get little first place ribbons and have them do a 'jump' course over boxes, books, branches. Make cupcakes instead of a cake and decorate them with green frosting that looks like grass and stick the mini horses on them. I dont know if they sell these were you live but if you get cheap hobby horses they could ride those around. give them construction paper with a barn drawn on it and have them stick foam animals on them (available almost everywhere) Have a pretend horse show. pin the tail on the pony. You could also buy 'horse ears'. i dont know what your budget is like but i helped my friend have a horse party for her 2 year old and this is what we did. his 5yr old brother thought it was pretty cool. Little plush ponies are always cool, hang them from a tree and give them out as party favors
Hello, If you go to Lowe's or Home Depot, you can get packing boxes very cheap. Maybe you could buy one for each child and draw "saddles" on them. Then let each child color their "horse" the way they want it to be. You can cut slit type handles in the sides and then a portion out of the top. If they are able to be outside, they can "ride" their horses around.
Good luck with your daughter's party.
K. K.
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Do you remember playing on stick horses when you were a kid? You could do races, round-ups and all kinds of active games. Combined with your corral idea and the horse figures it would be a blast. You could give away the horse figures or 'my little ponies' as party favors, have a rodeo themed cake....ask the kids to dress up in cowboy/cowgirl clothes...kids love dress up! Just remember yourself as a little horse loving girl and you will have a great party! I love the idea! L.
The Kaboose website always has cute theme party ideas. Here's a link to their "pony party" ideas. Some might be too complicated for preschoolers but I'm sure some ideas will work!
oooh the pony rides sound fun! you can have everyone come dressed as a cowgirl/cowboy. they have those little plastic boots at some of the craft stores - you could fill them full of things and had those out as thank yous for coming to the party. you can do pin the tail on the donkey and tell them its a horse - the wont know. breyer and melissa and doug have some cute horse things to play with. target also has a line of horse dolls/horses that are larger in size. they are kind of little to do this one, but breyer has the "paint" horse kits where you can paint your own horse.
