My daughter asked me if she could have a camping-themed sleepover party for her seventh birthday. She knew she wanted a tent set up in the living room and her friends spending the night “camping”. So the planning began; how many kids would be invited, how would we keep them entertained and most importantly, how would we convince them to fall asleep at night? After much consideration, we decided she could invite 2 of her friends to her party. Since we had decided to keep the party on the smaller size, we said that her friends’ could not only sleepover, but that we would also go to the movies to see Cinderella.
The set up
As soon as my daughter knew that her party idea was a go, she started pulling out sleeping bags and of course our tent from the crawl space in our basement. My daughter has never slept in a tent before (as we own a camper), so she was beyond excited to set everything up. A week before the party I spent the day setting up the tent and setting up the sleeping bag beds in our livingroom. My daughter really wanted to feel like she was camping and since there was still snow on the ground it was the best that we could do.
The Party
Her guests arrived at 3 p.m. on the day of the party and we headed straight for the movie theatre to see Cinderella. I purchased Fairy Godmother Wands from Toys R Us to make the movie a little more magical for the girls. We eat popcorn and the girls giggled from time to time throughout the movie. They loved when the Fairy Godmother appeared and held onto their wands tightly as they watched her work her magic getting Cinderella ready for the ball.
Back Home
After arriving home from the movie the kids were hungry. Pizza was ordered and cupcakes were attacked. Once the presents were opened the kids quickly took off to the tent.
It is amazing how excited four kids can be about sleeping on the floor in a tent. While the kids were playing around and getting ready for bed I called each of them to my craft room and showed them an Embroider Buddy® that my daughter had selected for them. They had no idea what these plush animals were but they knew they wanted one. I asked each child to pick out a thread colour and showed them how I was going to put their initial on the animal’s tummy. I sent them all back to the tent to work on a craft idea I found on Pinterest where they could create personalized pillowcases by colouring them fabric markers. While they were busy colouring their pillowcases, I completed each Embroider Buddy® and delivered them to the tent where they were instantly cuddled.
It took about an hour to get the kids settled but soon enough they were all fast a sleep in the tent.
The Morning After
For breakfast we made homemade waffles, bacon, eggs and hash browns and of course we had to invite Dino Dinosaur, Landy LadyBug, Monty Monkey and Mister Buddy Bear to join us for breakfast. We helped all the kids pack up their belongings and put their wands and personalized Embroider Buddy® into their pillowcases to go home. Everyone told their parents how much fun they had and showed them their new personalized stuff animals and then were on their way with big smiles on their faces.
Would you ever host a birthday party like this? If you have a story you'd like to share about Embroider Buddy®, please let us know and maybe we’ll publish it on the blog.
Sandi Bates is a mother of two and a full-time student at Durham College in Ontario, Canada. When she’s not at their hockey games, she loves doing crafts with her two school-aged children and curating inspirational boards on Pinterest. You can connect with her @SandiBates on Twitter. Note: Sandi was given the Embroider Buddy® stuffed animals referenced in exchange for contributing her story and photos.