What might be considered typical for a 4-8 year old's birthday party?

Question

I'm looking for ideas on what might be the typical elements for a birthday party for someone 4-8 years old. Games, activities, things like that.

Answer 1

My daughter had her 4th birthday party in the church basement. We had boys and girls aged 3 to 6. We scheduled the party for 2 hours. When the kids came in, they had a variety of games to play - nothing really organized. They colored, played skee-ball, ring toss, and feed the monster (ping pong balls through a monster mouth on a poster board.) We did an organized pin the tail on the donkey. We next had lunch - just pizza with juice boxes. Then we let the kids decorate their own cupcakes which they seemed to really enjoy. Right before everyone left, my daughter opened her presents.

Overall advice - don't over organize. Let the kids have some freedom to just be kids. Part of letting the kids-be-kids is the venue. We had our party in a place where we didn't have to worry about thing getting broken or others being concerned about the noise. What a relief for all involved - we didn't have to spend the day telling the kids "don't touch that" or "keep it down" or "no running." Don't plan the party for too long a period. For our crowd the 2 hours was just right. We didn't have to rush anything and the kids went home before they got too riled up.

Answer 2

This past year we had to have my 5 year old daughters birthday party from 7pm - 8:30 pm (only time and day the place had available) during the week on a school night. We didnt expect many to show up (as it was a school night, late, and also in Pre-K/K very few kids ever show up) but she had quite a few actually come (more than any other of her classmates party this year). No parent complained and most of the parents said that they enjoyed having it as they didnt have to rush through dinner, the kids got a great workout before bed (it was a bounce house place), and the kids were entertained. We even did the cake at 8pm so we left out ice cream and provided 1 juice box and if they were still thirsty they got water so that they wouldn't be to hyped up! The next day every parent said the kids passed out in the car and had no problem waking up to get ready for school in the morning!