Little House on the Prairie birthday party.

Today was Honor-May's 'Little House on the Prairie' birthday party. My first tip for a successful childrens party is to hire a couple of flippin' brilliant adult helpers. In this case my good friend Lisa and Zoe the local Supernanny voluntered to become Mrs Oleson (actually Lisa was not very happy about that!) and Miss Beadle, the levely teacher of Walnut Grove. I, of course was Ma and Hubby was Pa... and we wore badges to prove it!.

Of course Ma and Pa were busy preparing for this for at least, hmmmmm 10 days beforehand. We put an advert on Freecycle for some hay bales and luckily a kind chap donated some which served very nicely as seating. The table is a pasting table with the legs cut down. We also had a CD of fiddler music playing in the background.

We started the Party with 'school' - groan! (You should have seen the kids faces!)

We have had a LOT of rain the last couple of days. The first activities were indoors. After being divided into two teams - the Lauras and the Nellys - the children were sent to school to do a wordsearch and a spelling bee. A spelling bee (for the English) is a spelling competition. I do not know why it is called a bee! The Nellys won.

After school the children had to do their chores. Well, that is how it was in 'Little House'. So far there were quite a few bemused faces as they wondered 'isn't this supposed to be a party?' but as they got stuck into making butter (shaking whipping cream vigorously in a lidded container) and washing very dirty baby clothes with bars of soap and a scrubbing brush it did look as though most of them were enjoying themselves. The competitive spirit had certainly kicked in and strangely enough the Nellys seemed to be the most determined to win. I was also amazed at how clean those girls got the baby's clothes. The Lauras only lost a point because there was a slight stain on one of the jumpers. But otherwise the girls got some very dirty clothes spotless!

After the 'chores' the teams did crafts - making peg dolls and lemonade. By now there were a few cries of 'is it time to eat yet?' Well, yes - nearly. The lemonade was put on the dining table. I had a box of Capri suns ready for those who might not like the lemonade but I think only 2 got used... and probably in addition to drinking the lemonade. I think kids are more likely to enjoy what they are eating/drinking if they have made it themselves.

After the food I announced the winners...

The Nellys! Typical! The losers, however, accepted their defeat (and their booby prize of a lemon) with good grace. The Nellys got a kit-kat!

I think everyone enjoyed themselves - I know I did!


Ps. I have some much better, really fab, pics than these but as I don't have parental permission to post them, had better leave them out. Must say though that I loved the outfits that the girls wore and one of them even came with the Nellie ringlet hairdo. Cool!