Favorite Ideas for Thomas Party

[August Mom]

If you've had or been to a Thomas birthday party, please tell me what worked and what didn't as far as food, decorations, favors or whatever.

TIA

[MelissaTC]

I know I posted about this briefly in your invitation post but here I go again... :)

We did the party at Gymboree but it was a train theme. I ordered engineer hats (looked adorable on all the kids instead of party hats) and the goodie boxes (empty) from birthday express. For future parties, I will probably just go ahead and order favor boxes (goodies included) from them because it winds up being cheaper. It is so expensive to put those darn goodie boxes together!

I ordered train whistles from oriental trading. They were ok. The one we opened at home was not great but my friend claims her DD's was fine. I also got Thomas blow-outs from ot.

I don't know if you have gone to the birthday exp. website but they have a train treat pan. You might be able to find one by wilton at Michaels, AC Moore, etc.. A pinata might be fun. Or you can do a Thomas version of pin the tail on the donkey. Perhaps you can print out Annie and Clarabel and the kids can try to get them to Thomas. My friend threw a carnival theme party for her DD a few weeks ago and by far, the kids loved the pin the tail on the donkey best. Who would have thought that the 3 year olds enjoyed being blindfolded?

You can do hula hoops and they can pretend to be a train. They could then keep the hoop as a party favor. Have them move forward, then backwards (they did this at Gymboree).

Hope this helps a bit...

[August Mom]

Thanks for the ideas! I would never have thought of pinning cars on Thomas. Fun suggestion. Did you get the cloth engineer hats from Birthday Express or the cardboard ones you can get with the Thomas party supplies? If they were cloth, did they fit everyone okay?

You didn't happen to get the Thomas bubbles, did you? I wondered if the blowers worked well or not. They seem small.

I haven't seen the cake pan. I'll have to check it out. Right now I'm planning to get the cake at Kroger. There is a Thomas cake with 2 puzzle pieces and a windup Thomas that travels around the pieces on top of the cake. It looks cute. That's the only Thomas cake I've seen.

Thanks for the ideas.

[MelissaTC]

That is the Thomas cake we had! We got it at Harris Teeter. Last year, I got a Thomas cake from Lowe's Foods and it was a different cake entirely. It was cuter. It had a little fence and Thomas was supposed to be chugging along. He was the regular toy size.

We ordered the cloth ones. They are adjustable, like a baseball cap. The kids looked adorable in them. We didn't get the bubbles because they were sold out at the time. The wand is small but they work (we got them at another Thomas party). The blowers worked fine as well. They are perfect for the kiddies this size.

Hope you guys have a great party...sounds like it will be!