For my daughters 8th Birthday party, she requested that we throw a fifties party.
It was a blast both the planning and the actual party. We found very cute invitations and thank-you notes along with coordinating decorations clearanced at a factory outlet store. On the invites, we added that 50's attire was requested, but not required. The party was to be held at BIG AL'S DINER. When they arrived, out front was a BIG sign advertising BIG AL'S DINER. To our surprise, everyone came decked out from head to toe. It was so much fun to see everyone getting so into the theme. My husband and I were dressed up too. When they first arrived, we had hula hoop contests and jumprope contests until all 10 of the guests had arrived. Once everyone was there they all went to eat at Big Al's Diner (my husband's make shift diner set up in our kitchen and dining room) It was decorted with 50's theme posters on the walls and streamers. At each place setting was a pair of glitter 50's sunglasses for the girls to wear. For the table cloth, we put down a large sheet of white craft paper, so the girls could decorate and color while they waited for their food. The menu consisted of hotdogs, french fries, and chocolate/vanilla malts. We had purchased soda glasses for everyone. My husband ran the diner and made sure they were all waited on. He would pull little pranks on them to make them laugh(for example, we had purchased one of those trick bottles of ketchups that a string squirts out of). For dessert, they had cupcakes made to look like records and each one had a sparkling candle on top. After dinner we moved to the next room, where they played games. We did a popcorn tossing relay, a bubblegum blowing contest, a straw wrapper blowing contest, and a hot wheels drag race(50's style hot wheels cars blown across the floor with straws). Once we were done with the games we headed downstairs to the "sock hop". We had decorated the room with all kinds of 50's decorations. Records and streamers were hanging from the ceiling, musical notes of different colors were hanging on the walls. We had balloons in coordinating colors covering the floor, and we had inflatable guitars and saxaphones. We had set up the kareoke machine with all sorts of music from the fifties. The girls had a blast dancing and taking turns singing in the microphone. We also held a limbo contest at the dance. After the dance we went back upstaris to open presents and then it was time for the party to end. Each girl was sent home with a "goodie bag" consisting of a popcorn box full of surprises (inflatable guitars, small glass bottles of coke, microwavable popcorn, gel pens, notepads, small spiro kit, hamburger yo-yo, and blowpop suckers). In each thank-you note we sent a picture of the Birthday girl with the guest the note was for. It was so much fun! All the kids as well as their parents thought it was a riot and the pictures are adorable!! (2 htings that I wish I could have added were: 1) have lifesize cutouts of celebraties from the fifties to have the girls pose with 2) arrange for someone who owned a car from the era to come by for another photo opportunity) Also, thanks to all who submit ideas, I enjoy throwing parties and collecting ideas from this site. It has been a wonderful resource!!
