Theme Party Thursday: Strawberry Shortcake

Invites: Look for berry stickers or google "strawberry shortcake coloring pages" or "strawberry shortcake clip art" to find images for your invites.

It's a 'Berry' exciting day

because [child's name] is turning [age]!

Join us for a 'Berry Sweet' party to celebrate!

Berry Patch: (address)

Date:

Time:

Regrets Only (ph #)

Games/Activities:


Make Strawberry Sparkles: For this you will need fresh strawberries that have been washed an patted dry with paper towel. For the "sparkles" buy the colored sugar sparkles in your cake decorating/baking aisle. Ahead of time mix 4 oz softened cream cheese, 2 tsp powdered sugar, 4 tsp milk and 1/2 tsp vanilla. Add more milk if needed to achieve the desired consistency. Mix till creamy. Now, holding the berries by their stems, your kids can dip them into the cream cheese mixture, roll them in the sugar, and enjoy.

Fruit Basket Tipped Over Assign each guest a name of a fruit (or berry). There are enough chairs in a circle for everyone except one girl. The girl without the chair stands in the middle of the circle. Her objective is to take someone else's seat. She calls out two different types of fruit, for example "peaches and pears". The guests assigned to those fruits must get up and try to switch seats, while the one in the middle jumps on the chance to steal a seat. The one left without a seat is now the girl standing in the middle. The game continues until most have had a chance to be in the middle. Oh, the one in the middle has the option instead of just calling out two fruits, call out "fruit basket tipped over!" In this case, all of the guests get up and change seats.

Berry Cute Slippers Get some cheap flip flops, and some berry-themed fabric or ribbons (or just lots of berry colors). Cut fabric into strips and let the girls tie them to the flip-flops. Here are some examples:
Berry Patch Toss: Line of three wicker baskets in a single file line. Attach a card to each basket signifying the points. For example the closest basket is worth 10 pts, the middle basket 50, and the farthest 100. Have 3-5 red beanbags that are the "berries". Let the guests each take a turn to see how many berries they can get into the baskets. Highest score wins.

Silly Strawberry Shortcake Story: Find an easy-to-read strawberry shortcake book such as

Ahead of time, go through the story deciding which words to remove. Then make a list of the type of words you will need replaced by the girls, i.e., Noun, Adjective, Verb (tell them if it needs to be present or past tense), Adverb, etc. You can even ask for words like "Girl's name in room" or "something you eat" or "something you shout". If they need help, give them these hints. Noun=person, place or thing. Adjective=word that describes a noun. Verb=action word. Adverb=word that describes a verb, usually ends in -ly. Once you have all of the replacement words, read the Silly Story out loud to the group.

Food: Graham cracker squares with strawberry cream cheese. Strawberry Lemonade. And don't forget to eat the Strawberry Sparkles you made earlier.

Party Favors: If you made the flip flops, you don't need to send any other party favors home with them. Otherwise look for anything with Strawberry Shortcake or strawberries, i.e., hair clips, stickers, lip gloss.