Snowflake Playdate

When I was growing up, we didn't have people over much.  My parents were super-loving and devoted to God but to say that they were not devoted to decor or tidiness, for that matter, would be an understatement of the greatest extreme.  It left me with a bit of a fear of entertaining - I get so nervous that people will think our house is a mess or that we aren't hospitable.  Silly, I know, given that the people that one generally invites to ones home tend to be people who one loves but there it is.  It's been something that I am determined to overcome, especially since I view hospitality as something that can be an outward show of my faith.

Pk is always asking to have friends over for playdates and since we are so busy (and overscheduled these days :-(  ), we just never seem to get around to it.  Then, over Christmas I had an idea.  Instead of trying to fit in a playdate here and there, once a month, we would have a "playdate party" and invite several friends.  It also lets me play around on Pinterest, one of my favourite pastimes, so we all win.

We had our first playdate party today and I would say that it was a raging success.  We decided to call it a "snowflake party."  I invited four girls and told their moms that they could stay or go, whichever they preferred.  Three of the four opted to stay and one of the nicest parts of the day for me what having a good visit with the moms.  It's terrific to have girlies old enough to play on their own now!

They had some free time together and then, we did some crafts.  I had three planned and we only got to two since we kind of ran off the rails with the glitter - I often forget that girls and glitter are a match made in heaven!

We started with these marshmallow snowflakes ("can I eat one? just one mommy?) which were a huge hit and then we moved onto these glitter snowflakes.  Needless to say, the table was covered in glitter (thank goodness I just had a dollar store tablecloth down, I just wrapped it all up and out it went).  I wanted to make these pipecleaner snowflakes, I thought they were really, really cute but the "My Little Ponies" and the princess costumes were calling and the girls just couldn't stay sitting any longer.

I also had lots of snowflake fun with the food.  We had snowflake tortillas, snowflake quesadillas and I cut the coldcuts, the cheese and the bread with my large snowflake cookie cutter so the girls could make their own snowflake sandwiches.  I rounded it out with some veggies and some fruit and some Babybel cheese and we had a feast perfect for a five year old.  Needless to say, I had fun with dessert too - there were hot chocolate and marshmallow cupcakes, marshmallow wands (Pk's favourite treat ever) and homemade marshmallows (which were meant for hot chocolate had we played outside in snow but the weather didn't cooperate).

I have to say, I found this party to be so enjoyable and people stayed way past the "finish" time so I am going to assume that we will do this again.  I know that Pk loved it and I think the moms really had fun just getting a chance to sit and chat.  This is definitely something that I want to repeat and there were plans today for a movie and pyjama party theme the next time round.  Guess I had better spend some time on Pinterest, LOL!