Book Cafe Birthday Party (7th Birthday): For the love of books

For Daughter #1: Thank you for loving books the way you do.

I've made no secret of my love of books. I cannot fall asleep without reading at least a chapter of something. It is my way to wind down at the end of the day, and it is also my way to escape when things are crazy. One of my students once asked me how I would like to escape, and I told him that I'd like to get a stack of books, crawl into bed and read my way through the day. That would be my dream. Food would be optional (but likely) and sleep would definitely be optional. The printed word for me is where I want to be.

I've worked hard at trying to instill that same passion into Daughters and Son. We read together all the time and I make books a priority over any other media, if I am able to. Of course there are times when TV wins out, when I'm tired or exhausted, but mostly, I ask Children to turn to books when they are bored.

For Daughter #1's 7th Birthday party, I casually mentioned wanting to do a book cafe themed party. She asked me what it would be like, and I just told her we'd set up a cafe and have the kids come and read. I'd have some simple games to play together, and some fun making a few crafts. She eagerly agreed and asked that I call it "Book Cafe." With that I ran with the idea, and was possibly more excited about it than Daughter #1 was.

I felt strongly that it wouldn't be right to invite only some of the people in her class, so we went ahead and invited all of the females in her class. My strategy for limiting the number of people was to invite them with only one week notice. I figured that many wouldn't be able to make it given the short notice. Yeah...not so much. All but two of the guests we invited RSVP'd with a yes, which meant 18 screaming, giggling girls.

Invitations
I wanted the invites to look like a bookmark, so I came up with this.

Daughter #1 had a blast passing them out to all the girls and so I was happy.

Party Decorations
This was about creating an inviting space for kids to want to read more than anything...so I set up a book shelf with various levels of books available.

I also made a cute birthday banner with an easy tutorial from Sillie Smile. (here)

I made these paper garland balls with a tutorial from here. These were really soothing to make late at night when I wanted to escape. They aren't hard, but they do take some time, so think in advance if you really want to start them.

In case anyone thinks that I have excellent coordinating skills in terms of matching, sadly that is not true. I used one of these coordinated paper sets. They coordinate for you and all you need to do is madly punch out a bunch of 2 inch or smaller circles. (I highly recommend getting a punch to do your cutting for you. I bought both things at Michaels, using one of their weekly 40% off coupons)





























I also made some signs - one for the cafe being "open" and another one was for the menu. I wanted the guests to be encouraged to read signage, and understand the importance of reading in their daily lives. I did go over the menu verbally so as to allow everyone a chance to understand what was available without trying to make anyone insecure. I was pleased to see how many girls did choose to refer to the menu and read it aloud as they made their choices.

Activities
Entering the cafe: Upon entering the cafe, I welcomed each child, and had Daughter #1 also welcome then. I also invited them over to choose a book and sit on the sofa and read while we waited for everyone to arrive. Many girls really enjoyed this and eagerly grabbed their books and sat and talked with others as they shared their books.

Storytime: Once the bulk of the guests had arrived, I did ask the girls to sit down and allow me to read a chapter from a book to them. Daughter #1 chose one of her favorite books, Ellen Tebbits, and it was one that I knew that few had read. They enjoyed the reading, and hopefully from it decided that they wanted to read MORE of the book (even if they had to ask for help from their parents.)














Charades: I wanted to give the more active girls a chance to act out different books and for many this was the VERY FIRST time they had ever played charades. Daughter #1 had also never been exposed to it, which is strange considering how much Husband and I played this gave in our 20's. But I helped the game along by creating a wall of possible book titles, and this enabled the kids to have a chance to guess. It was not competitive and mostly about getting the girls to act things out. I modeled the first two for them, using Husband as the ideal guest who knew all of the hand gestures and together we taught the girls things like "Three words", "First word", "Sounds like."

Balance a book on your head
We played a fun little game where we saw how far kids could balance a book on their head, sort of "charm school" style. Interestingly enough, the girl who is serious about ballet did the best on this, and she was pretty darn cute going up and down the stairs with a book balanced on her head.

Crafts
I generally have the guests at almost all of my parties make their own goody bag. It saves me the stress of figuring out how to make them, and it also encourages some creativity on a bag that will be ultimately tossed. So at least for a moment, it has a chance to shine. I decided it would be nice to have the kids think about their favorite books and display with pride what they thought of them. I also did leave it open so that not everyone had to finish them and for the most part many had some difficulty READING the questions and then I was helping with all of the spelling. This activity is not for the fainthearted, but if you're patient with an ability to handle 20 "How do you spell Snow White" at the same time, it is really good. It also revealed to me very interesting facts about Daughter #1's peers and it was fun learning about her classmates.

If you like this, you can print it from here.

Making Bookmarks
I had a lot of rather grandiose ideas about how these would turn out, but unfortunately glitter glue ruined everything. I will say it now, and repeat it later, glitter glue is NOT the way to go. The girls just went NUTTY with them, and there was just no way to deal with all of the goopy glitter glue. If I had just stuck to markers, or stickers even, it would have been a much better craft. I have no pretty pictures to show you because they were ALL sticky and gross with glittery goop leaking everywhere. But below is the basic bookmark. I picked up a pack of blank bookmarks at Michaels and then added a punch and a grommet at the top, mostly because I had them. (not necessary.) I planned for the girls to decorate them and and then would have stuck a ribbon at top so that it would stick out of the book. The glitter glue changed all that. I suggest stickers and markers if you want to do this.

Making Bookbags
This was the project I REALLY wanted to do, based on a project that I saw on Martha Stewart. I planned to make little iron on's of everyone's name and then would allow the girls to decorate the bags with fabric markers. Unfortunately I was priced out of it, as the only tote bags I could find were over $3. However, MUJI has tote bags for LESS THAN A DOLLAR (here), and I was annoyed I didn't find it in time. It would have changed the party a bit. (I would have NOT had paper goody bags, and instead would have made the totebag their goody bag.)

Cafe Time
Menu
Spinach dip
Fruit salad (honeydew, cantaloupe, pineapple, strawberries, blackberries, blueberries)
Cheese and crackers (Wheat Thins and Babybel cheese)
Strawberry Lemonade
Strawberry Cupcakes (this cake with this frosting)

The girls helped clean up and then they got in line to order from the cafe. Ahead of time I prepackaged fruit and veggies and dip. I did not want to struggle serving the kids, and I wanted the line to go as quickly as possible. The girls walked to the window, looked at the menu, and I asked them, "What would you like to order?" and then popped the fridge open and gave them what they wanted. Fruit salad was by far the biggest seller and veggies and dip, I only "sold" three among the 18 girls. The little plastic containers I picked up at smart and final. I served the cupcakes at the very end, after we sang happy birthday. They were gobbled down, no doubt. (I made minis)

Goody Bags
I made each child one of these booklets.

Each guest also received bookplates, which I made using these labels, a color printer and a layout program. I loved them and the guests did as well.














We also gave each child a new book. Amazon has the best value for books, as many of their titles are 4 for 3 and you can get free shipping as well as no tax. We gave everyone B is for Betsy , a title which I have reviewed on my sadly neglected books blog. (post here)














Thank You Notes
I really like to have Daughter #1 do thank you notes, and this year her writing skills were good enough to handle a bit more. I made them using basic cards I picked up from Michaels, using the circle punch from the paper garlands and then the graphic I used for most of her party. I gave her a headstart and helped her with the basic structure and she wrote an individual card to each guest.

As always, if you see something here that you want to recreate for your own child's birthday, I encourage you to steal some or all of the ideas. I really invite you to do this, especially this birthday party which really was about my passion for getting kids to read. Send me an email if you want some help with the invitations or anything else. Happy party planning!