22751

Luau Sleepover 13yr - Tiki Cutouts & a Boardwalk

May 2011

Megan in New Cumberland, PA USA

Runner Up

This year I have decided to host an end of school summer luau for me and 5 of my closest friends. Get ready, because this is one party you’ll never forget.

For INVITATIONS I made an invite on this website: http://invitationland.com/free-invitation-maker.html?cardtoload=7, they were purple, lavender, and yellow with a hibiscus design. I chose the option to print 4 per page and cut these out and glued them to the inside of a plain sand-colored card. On the front I put an image from Google that said Luau party and I put sequins around the border of the invitation. I told people on the invitations to bring $10 and any sleepover stuff along with a bathing suit. I glued a fake hibiscus flower on the front as well; these will be handed out at school.

For DECORATIONS I am going to have a different theme in every room that has to do with a tropical feel. The kitchen will be the Tiki Bar, and will be decorated with a lei garland from OTC, Tiki cutouts that I drew on brown butcher paper and added embellishments such as flowers and feathers, etc., and I will have a few balloons and streamers here and there. The dining room will have an under the sea theme and will be decorated with blue and white streamers and balloons, various sea life that I made out of construction paper, a few blow up dolphins I got from a local carnival held every year last year at the duck game (hehe), and some sea life stuffed animals, such as dolphins, sea turtles, sponge bob, etc. The table will have a yellow tablecloth and blue paper plates with luau napkins, and we will have coconut cups from OTC with little umbrellas and straws in them.

For the centerpiece I will have one of my American Girl Dolls in a swimsuit sitting on her beach chair on a cookie sheet covered with sand-colored paper (don’t get an AG doll near sand) with a mini beach ball and her swimming accessories. You might want to take this off when people eat though, since you probably don’t want anything to happen to your doll. The family room will be the Boardwalk. The boardwalk will contain different shops, see activities, and will be all Hawaiian-y J. The playroom will be the hotel where we will all set up our sleeping bags and stuff, I have a TV in there and a couch, so 2 people can have the couch, 2 can have the HUGE black and white spotted pillows, and the other 2 can have beanbags. Either that or I will just move out the couch and put a ton of big pillows and blankets everywhere.

THE PARTY: As every one is arriving they will be greeted with a lei and they will need to check in and put their things in the hotel (playroom) there we will decorate large neon tote bags from OTC ($10 for 12) with fabric paint. These will double as goody bags, guests can put their stuff in them that they get/make throughout the night. After we are done, we will change into our bathing suits and go outside to just chill for a while, it will be up to us on what we do. I will have out water balloons, a slip n’ slide, a large kiddie pool, my trampoline of course, my basketball hoop, bikes, skateboards, you name it. When everyone looks bored we will start the first game, which will be a sponge relay, where there will be 2 teams of 3 and each team has 2 buckets, 1 with water and one without, spaced about 15 ft apart, time for 1 minute and see which team can get the most water in their bucket. Next we will have a classic water balloon toss, followed by jumping on the trampoline with the sprinkler on under it!!! The team that wins the water balloon toss (2 people) will go 1st, 2nd place will go 2nd, etc. Each pair gets 5 minutes, set a timer so it’s fair.

Then we will all race on the racer slip n’ slide. When we’re done, depending on how everyone is, we may stay outside for a while after or we might go inside and dry off and get ready for our next activity. When we go in we’ll just dry off and put shorts on over our bikinis so we don’t have to re-change later. When we go in, we will head to the boardwalk for our next activity: decorating flip-flops!!! I will get everyone a pair of white flip-flops from Michaels, and we will decorate them with colored Sharpies, fabric strips, paint, beads, charms, etc. A good ideas would be to have everyone sign each other’s flip-flops and maybe write like a message, since this party is for at the end of the school year and you won’t be seeing each other probably for a while. Just make sure you let them dry before you wear them so it doesn’t rub off on your feet. When our flip-flops are done we will go to the jewelry shop on the boardwalk and make glow in the dark jewelry with glow in the dark pony beads from OTC.

After that we will probably go back outside for a little while until dinner (see food). After dinner we will be off to break open the coconuts. I am planning on making coconuts by paper macheing a balloon, putting prizes in it when it dries, and covering up the hole and spray painting it brown. The prizes inside the balloon will included: mini beach monkey beach ball from OTC (5.99 for 12), a whistle ($3 for 12 @ OTC), some glow in the dark star bands ($5 for 50 @ OTC), butterfly lipgloss and a few pieces of tropical candy from dollar tree. The catch is that you can’t use your hands!

After this is done we will go back out side where there will be water guns waiting for us to have a water fight! Then we’ll chill some more outside (gotta work on that tan, ya know?) until it gets dark, after which we will go inside and I will tell everyone that we might as well get our PJs on-except guess what?!!! There will be a mysterious note taped to the door that my mum will put there giving us a clue to follow, followed by a series of clues that will lead us to a treasure chest (and old shoe box colored and covered with fake jewels) containing 6 pairs of glow in the dark shuttered shades ($8 for 12 @ OTC) and a note saying to go change fast and run to the driveway wearing anything you made that night (the flip-flops, bracelets, sunglasses, etc.)and your PJs and meet your chauffer to reach your mystery destination, (which will be the local movie theater where we will be viewing Judy Moody and the not bummer summer) at the latest showing, preferably around 9:45. *This is why everyone had to bring $10, I didn’t want to ask my parents to pay for everyone. We will get a big popcorn and a few big drinks to share, and we will wear all of our glow stuff at the movie unless someone there yells at us ;)

We will then go home and play a few more games, such as: The surfing game: everyone lays on their stomach except for one person who is the surfer, the surfer lays on top of everyone in like a t form, if you get what I’m talking about, and the people on the bottom simultaneously roll over, and the surfer really rides the wave! I have actually tried this out, and it’s totally awesome being the surfer. Truth or Dare, a classic, Would you rather?, etc. are all fun games that girls always play. If we get tired out I will pop in the movie Our Lips Are Sealed, even though it’s in Australia, they’re at the beach a lot in the movie, and we’ll just watch, talk, and chill until we drift off. In the morning we have an Island Buffet (see food), and then we will go swim some more and jump on the trampoline until it’s time for everyone to leave.

GAMES/ACTIVITIES: see above.

FOOD: for dinner we will be having make your own pizza, regular salad, fruit salad, goldfish, Jell-O with gummy fish, etc. For breakfast my mom will set up a breakfast bar with things like: a ton of different cereals, bagels, pop tarts, English muffins, toast, butter, peanut butter, cream cheese, bananas, apples, pears, pineapple, grapes, etc., milk, orange juice, apple juice, and any other breakfast food we happen to have. And we will have popcorn and soda at the movies. We will also have soda, Capri Sun, Juice boxes, water, etc available in a palm tree cooler outside right inside the door (in the dining room-it leads out to the backyard)

FAVORS: Each guest will go home with: a decorated tote bag, decorated flip-flops, glow in the dark shutter shades, a lei, a few star bands, an inflatable mini beach monkey beach ball, a whistle, a few pieces of candy, and their glow in the dark jewelry, butterfly lip-gloss, their coconut cup and a squirt gun. This party could end up being a little pricey, but it will be so worth it!

COST: Well, I have been planning this for a while, and I made a ton of decorations by hand from stuff I had at home and shopped around at yard sales for a few things, plus my mom had a ton of stuff left over from a luau a few years ago, so I ended up getting napkins, coconut cups, leis, the tablecloth, luau confetti, and the lei garlands from up in my attic: cost-$0 (for me anyways, hehe) I got a 6 pack of butterfly lip-gloss at a yard sale for like 25 cents. I got the movie Our Lips Are Sealed on VHS from a local used bookstore for 25 cents, when I got it, it was new, still factory sealed. I have all of the decorations, except for balloons ($4 for 4 packs of 25 for a total of 100 balloons @ dollar tree) and streamers ($1 for 2 rolls at dollar tree- I already have a few left over from a past birthday party, that’s why I only need 1 pack) Since I saved so much on these things, I decided to splurge a little on Oriental Trading. I ordered glow in the dark shutter shades ($7.99 for 12), glow in the dark pony beads ($8.99 for 1800), glow in the dark star fun bands ($4.99 for 50), inflatable mini beach monkey beach balls ($5.99 for 12), whistle expando bracelet key chains ($2.99 for 12), Shimmering Fabric paint set ($14.99 for a set),large neon tote bags ($9.99 for 12) and Neon Grip Squirt guns ($4.99 for 12).

I also bought a pair of flip-flops for each guest at $1 per pair at Michaels, with a 40% off coupon (I collected them from friends to get 6, just purchased each separately so flip-flops really only cost me 60 cents each, for a total of $3.60 for 6 pairs of flip-flops) The cost for all of this comes out to $70.02, not including tax. So, if you’re on a tight budget in this horrid economy, this sure is a great party option for less then $100 even when food costs and stuff are added in. Of course, a lot of this stuff I was lucky that I got from relatives that didn’t need it, my advice would be to just ask around, check out yard sales, because you never know. Your friends will think you spent gobs of money, when really it’s pretty cheap to create an at-home paradise for you and your friends. Especially old movies if you have a VHS player still, some classics for girls that can be easily found on video with a summer/tropical theme are: Holiday in the Sun, Billboard Dad, Out Lips Are Sealed, My Girl, My Girl 2, The Babysitters Club, etc. if you want a new movie to watch. Yeah I get it, I’m cheap, but in an economy like this, what else are you gonna do, really? I’m just lucky my VHS player still works J Anyways, yep that was the cost of everything.

THANK YOU NOTES-I’m just going to send everyone a text or Facebook message or an email saying like thanks for coming or whatever, since it’s not a birthday party. A great thing to do is to take tons of pictures during your party and the next day when you’re too tired to move, upload them to Facebook and tag your friends in them and everything, it saves trees (I guess) because you don’t have to print it out, and your other friends get to see you had an awesome party that they weren’t invited to lol just kidding ;)

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