Wonderful Wonderland -16yr- Playing Card Invites

Alice in Wonderland  Perfect for Sweet 16!   For a silly festive night of fun, this Alice in Wonderland party will tickle the fancy of any guest you invite! It's bright colors and dream like setting will fill guests imagination with wonder and awe! Based on the book by Lewis Carroll, and designed after the Disney animation movie, Alice in Wonderland, this creative party will be one your friends will never forget!    

PART ONE: INVITATIONS   What You'll Need:  Brightly colored metallic cardstock papers Glue Pretty Patterned Ribbon Ruler and Pencil Empty deck of playing cards, one for each invitation. (Don't worry about wasting the cards, because you'll be using them in the party décor later!)\\ A few spare cards for each invitation Computer and Printer  1. On the computer, type out what the invitation will say:  FOR EXAMPLE:  You're Invited to a trip down the Rabbit's Hole for Your Name and Party Reason Where Everything is Nonsense and Everyone's a Little Mad!  Lunch and Refreshments will be Served at a Mad Hatter's Tea Party! Forget Your Mind for a Night, Date and Time! Please Wear Bright Crazy Colors! And if you haven't seen if before, make sure to watch Disney's Animation Movie of Alice in Wonderland, before you come! Don't be Late for this Very Important Date!  Print it out small enough to fit into the middle of a card deck. 

Take your cardstock, and cut it out to fit over a card deck. (You could also use scrap booking scissors, the ones with the decorative cutting edge!)  2. Take the cardstock cutout, and glue your invitation in the middle. Then take that, and glue it onto the front of a card.  3. Take the card, and stick it in the empty deck. Throw a few extra playing cards in there just for fun! You could even space it out, by putting a sentence of the invitation on each playing card, so they have to flip through it in order to read the whole invitation! That would just require more cardstock!  Close the deck, tie a pretty ribbon around it, and hand them out!     

PART TWO: Decorations     ENTRANCE  An important part of every party, is when each guest enters. If you make that really special, its something that will just really polish the theme. For your awesome party entrance, your going to recreate a few parts of the movie, that the guest will have to go through in order to reach Wonderland.   Most backyards have side gates. If its double door, you'll need two pieces of thin wood, and if not just one. Buy a piece of wood that fits the size of your gate, and paint it to look like the inside of the book. When dry, tie it securely to the front side of the gate.   When a person goes through the gate, they will enter a tunnel of balloon arches that grow smaller and smaller, leading from the gate to the entrance of wonderland. Balloon arches can be very easily made! All you need is lots of black and white helium filled balloons and curling ribbon, and stakes! The instructions can be found online.  

Once you made and placed your balloon-arch-tunnel, at the far end, place a portable CD player. Have it playing the Alice in Wonderland Main Title song. You order the soundtrack online or download it from a trusted online music store.  As a guest goes through the Rabbits Hole the sounds of wonderland will grow louder. Giving the effect of approaching wonderland.   At the end of the entrance, build a large overhead bridge of giant playing cards! Take a PVC pipe that works best for the size of bridge arch that you want, and securely stake each end into the ground. Take as much white poster board as you need to cover the arch. Cut each board in half and paint them to look like giant playing cards. Hot glue them in random angles over the entire arch.  Take a poster board, and on the top of it, paint in large letters, WHO ARE YOU? And under it, in tiny letters, Write your name and a birthday message here!  Hang it dangling down in the middle from the card bridge. Use long pieces of curling ribbon, and tie it dangling, and at the end of each piece, tie colorful markers for the guest to write with.   

PART THREE: Party Scenery   Your backyard will be magically transformed into a curious wonderland where everything is what it isn't! Guests will step into wonderland, and immediately feel like they're in a different world of their own!   Wonderland Ceiling   Take Christmas lights, and string them back and forth from tall posts so they cover the Wonderland Sky. Do a pattern of lights and playing card garland.   To make the playing card garland, take long strands of red ribbon, and decks of cards, and with each card, punch a hold in the top and string it through the ribbon, when your done with one strand tie a knot at each end and create the next. When done hang them in-between the lights. 

FENCE WALLS  On the walls surrounding your backyard, rent a few movie projectors. Get white paper, and tape the paper over the entire surrounding walls. You could even create a funky border around the screens out of a thin wood. Play around with the projectors until you get them properly set up to aim at the walls equally.   On each projector, play the Alice in Wonderland Disney movie, starting and repeating at different chapters. This special touch will not only make your surroundings LOOK like wonderland, but the MOVING scenery and characters will feel almost realistic!    Backyard and Tree Décor  With thin compressed sheets of wood, sketch and cut out some of the characters such as, the caterpillar, Tweedle Dee and Dum, Mr. Rabbit, the Mad Hatter, Card Men, The Mad Queen and many little Cheshire Cat heads.  Once they are painted and dry, place them around the yard. With the Cheshire Cat Heads, have them poking out from bushes and trees.   Take colored paper lanterns, and hang them from the trees, along with tissue paper red and white flowers.  With Christmas lights, wrap them around the base of the trees.

For your house, turn it into Mr. Rabbits house, when Alice grows big. Take natural grass hula skirts or table skirting, and secure it to the top of the back porch. With large construction paper, cut out a size that will fit each window that the guests will be able to see from your backyard.  Draw and color Alice's arms, legs, and hair, eye and ect. Tape them to the inside of the window so it looks as if Alice is about to pop out of the house!  Gift Area  In one corner of your yard, create a large mushroom for you to sit at and open presents. Take a low circular coffee table, and cover it with a beige fabric. Stuff it with lots of polyfill and secure the extra fabric under the tables legs. Have the guest place the gifts on the mushroom table.  Mad Hatter Tea Party  Place together long rectangular tables so it creates one very long table from one side of your yard to the other. Layer colorful table clothes over the entire table, and place as many chairs as you can fit around the table, if you can fit more chairs than the actual number of guest you have, that's fantastic.   Have the chairs all shapes and heights. Tie helium balloons and fun bows and bells and nonsense on each chair. 

At each place setting, but mismatched place mats and plates, bowls, silverware and cups, teacups and dessert plates. Have funky folded napkins in each cup.  Have tea pots, and vases with tissue paper flowers and all sorts of crazy centerpieces going down the middle of the table.   Create a long clothing line over the table, and hang more paper lanterns so they hang over the table.   Place a loud music system by the table, and have it playing the music from the Mad Tea Party scene. Have an adult every 5 minutes call out, Clean Cup! and make everyone run around the table and find a new spot.   Have a special activity planned. You could hire a little theatre group to do a Alice in Wonderland Skit while guests are eating. Or get some family and friend adults to dress up like the characters and talk to the guests, act out scenes, or teach the guests funny tricks!   

PART THREE: Food for the Party  For your Mad Hatter Tea Party your going to want a mixture of fun food!   Buy or make a few batches of different cookies, sugar, chocolate chip, M&M, snicker doodle, gingersnap. On each cookie, in icing write, EAT ME.  In crystal bowls, have snack mixes like chex, chips, trail mix  Have silver platters with tea sandwiches, PB+J, and small bowls of soup.  Provide a large variety of food in fun displays.    This fantastically whimsical party will be the talk of wonderland!