Food and lifestyle with a dusting of magic
If you are a mum you know that planning a children’s party can be very hard work. You need to worry about planning the games, the food, the invites and making sure that everything runs smoothly. Now a lot of children’s parties take place at hired venues, rather than being in the house. This is a shame as a small house party is often more intimate. Acting The Party aim to change this with their parties in a box. Everything is planned for you, an audio CD provides the entertainment, the games are all planned and provided, all you really need to to is to invite the kids and sort out the food.
I was sent one of these packs to try out and given it was near Halloween we were sent the Spooky Spectacular. My son who is eleven was looking at the pack with great interest and couldn’t wait to organise the party. He started making a list of people to invite which got longer and longer. I managed to trim his guest list down to a sensible size.
As the name suggests Acting the Party is a play. Each of the children invited get to be a different character in the play and the invitations tell them who they are and suggests they should dress accordingly. My son had great fun deciding who should be which character.
Inside the pack is an instruction booklet and a leaflet which explains the games in more detail. The instruction book tells you exactly what you need to prepare ahead of time. We needed two party prizes for the games. One was for Pass the Parcel and one for Pin the Tail on the Werewolf.
We also needed party bags for the end of the party and a costume for my son. The only other thing to organise was the food, the instructions recommend pizza. We also decorated the house in a spooky fashion.
Party day arrived and my son was really excited. I do not have any photographs of the actual party because I didn’t want to put photographs of other children on the internet. They all looked fabulous in their costumes and looking forward to doing something a little bit different. They were all giggling and jumping about in excitement.
The party is based around a CD which you listen to. It organises the games, all you need to do is listen and follow the instructions. This is great as it means parents have their hands free to supervise. I put the CD on and suitably spooky music set the scene. The kids were entranced, although a little noisy and soon got into the acting. Each of the characters is introduced and has their own little bit of acting to do at various stages. The CD unravels a story involving the characters, with games along the way. The games were a big hit, the treasure hunt especially as they had little treats to unwrap when they solved the clue.
Pin the tail on the werewolf was also a bit hit, mainly because of the way the werewolf was sticking out his bottom. This caused a lot of giggles amongst eleven year old boys.
The party was a big success. The CD was well narrated and suitably spooky with plenty of music. It was all timed perfectly and it took a lot of the stress off me as I didn’t have to worry about getting things organised. The children had a great time and went home happy.
The Acting The Party Spooky Spectacular is aimed at boys aged 7 – 9 but mine were all around 10 – 11 and they really enjoyed it. The party pack I was sent is the standard pack which is RRP £19.99. You can also get the deluxe gift pack version which comes with loot bags at RRP £31.75. There are a range of different themes for Acting the Party, you can find them at http://www.actingtheparty.co.uk/welcome/. Look out for their Christmas Pantomime party which should be available as a download soon at RRP £10.
I would definitely recommend Acting The Party, we had great fun and it was really easy to organise.
Disclosure: I was sent a pack from Acting The Party in order to hold a party and try it out, but was not told what to write and my opinions are my own.
