princess tea-less birthday party

we decided more than a year ago that we would only do party’s for the odd year birthdays. the even years, it would just be a family thing. after spending all too much money on adam’s first birthday, i was discouraged to plan jenna’s third birthday. early last week, i thought that a small, daytime get together would be great. a friend had mentioned her daughter recently went to a tea-party and it was great. {the only downfall was that it would be girly so our friends that are boys and cousins that are boys would miss out. :( }
we sent out an email last week inviting a few 3-4 year old (one almost 2 year old) and were excited that they ALL we going to come. i was focused and determined to not break the bank on this party! keeping it small and having it at home are a must if you want to save a few bucks.
  
since it’s impossible for me to capture everything in pictures, let me describe what i did. we covered the table in a bed sheet, since i don’t have any table cloths (*gasp*, i know!), and jazzed it up with flowers and paper cutouts and dollies. we used real dishes and mugs- which made for an extra run of the dishwasher, but the girls liked feeling like grown up princesses. we had muffins with little crowns stuck to toothpicks, croissants, whole wheat bread with nutella, pb&j sandwiches shaped like flowers, strawberries, grapes, jello, cheese and pretzels drizzled with almond bark (one of my personal favorites). since we were only feeding 8 little girls, i didn’t have to go crazy with quantity. that’s always a concern for me when throwing a party- the fear of running outta food. we had a quick ‘princess etiquette’ lesson before we started and they all did really well.
we played plant a kiss on the frog prince- and it was adorable! the princesses got a kick out of lipstick and kissing the frog. i found this clipart online and just sketched it on the back of a double wide sheet of freezer paper. oh how i love freezer paper…

i made my own piñata. cool huh? try goggling ‘make your own piñata’ and check out how easy it is. i used a tortilla chip bag that dave had recently finished off, and wiped it out. i decorated it with streamer paper and a princess clip art picture and filled it with candy. it worked great and was free to make!
i checked out a disney princess cd out from the library and it was perfect! it was actually titled, ‘a princess tea party’ and provided great background noise. we could have played musical chairs, but kinda ran out of time and attention for organized games.


i fashioned princess hats for the girls using scrapbook paper that i’ve had forever. they stayed on their heads much better with bobby pins… but they looked cute.      
thank you princess ava, princess cambria, princess molly, princess clara, princess abigail, princess hannah, and princess ellie for making princess jenna’s tea-less birthday party so special!
*i’ll add pic that i get from friends in the next few days. FRIENDS, send me your pics :)