Top tips ... party games for 2 year olds

This is another one of my "trading" posts where I offer up one of my lists - in this case top tips for party games for 2 year olds - in exchange for the list I really need right now which is a list of party ideas that will keep a bunch of 2 to 5 year olds entertained whilst their parents get on with the important stuff  join in very enthusiastically ;-)

Luckily littl'un was the youngest at nursery when she first started so we got to sample other people's parties and pillage lots of ideas from other people before we had her second birthday.  The trick for 2 year old's seems to be to keep it fairly small, short and simple.  Just 5 to 6 children tops, for not much more than 90 minutes with some combination of the following types of activities:

• Singing favourite songs - with box of instruments, puppets, actions, dancing
• "Funny" games that mum's join in with e.g. bottom shuffling races, crawling races, musical bumps, musical statues but without anyone going out & no prizes - they will love seeing all the mums crawling or bottom shuffling
• Treasure hunts
• Reading a funny, well known story which they can join in with e.g. Monkey Puzzle
• Anything involving making funny noises
• A big basket of bricks, mega bloks, lego etc that everyone can "share" ... hmmm
• Decorating masks or hats - either just colouring with crayons or sticking but warn other mums in advance if going to be sticking
• Decorating fairy cakes - silences the room like magic!

So those are my tips for a successful party for 2 year olds and now I need your ideas on how to entertain a whole group ranging from 2 to 5 in a fairly small house when it might be raining!  Please .....


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