I have to admit—throwing my middle child a birthday party this year wasn’t on my radar. Still recovering from the craziness of the holidays and exhausted from my pregnancy I was focuses on other things. Although we always make a big deal about birthdays, we don’t throw them a big “friend” party every year. She’d “just” had a friend party two years ago so I figured she was good for another year. But the second my husband suggested we throw her a party this year the birthday girl immediately knew what theme she wanted and would not be swayed—a princess and pirate party.

princess and pirate birthday party

Part of the problem with a Winter birthday is you can’t count on the weather. You have to plan for an inside party because the chances of cold or rain are just too great. This is hard for me because I’m not a fan of a million organized games and prefer to just let the kids run around and play. However, I think we came up with some fun activities and the weather actually ended up being gorgeous so they kiddos could play outside for a bit too!

loot bags

After the guests first arrived I had them decorate their own loot bags. I knew that they’d need something to store all their treats for the next activity and this would be something fun to do. I ordered these drawstring bags from Amazon and they were the perfect size. Using my Silhouette I cut each guest’s name out to personalize the loot bag. Then each child was able to decorate their bags with these fabric markers. It was so fun to see what designs each child came up with!

treasure hunt

Once their loot bags were done being decorated Mike took them around the house and yard on a treasure hunt. There were five different spots for them to find that each had a different treasure. I’m no artist but I think the map I drew up worked just fine for the purpose. I tried to keep with the Princess and Pirate theme for the treasure as much as possible and the five stations contained:

• ringpops
• gold coins
• coloring pages from Camp Castle Playmats
• mini playdoh
• paint-your-own cookies from Cooling Rack Confections

cupcakes

The birthday girl felt very strongly that she wanted her guests to decorate their own cupcakes. So while Mike was taking the little princess and pirates around on their treasure hunt I set out the funfetti cupcakes. Kids love getting to decorate their own desserts! To help things run smoothly I always like to set out individual portions of everything—frosting in little bags and sprinkles in mini cupcake liners.

Have you planned a birthday party lately? Do you go big or try yo keep it simple?