The best activities for an 8- to 12-year-old girl’s birthday party

Your little girl’s birthday is coming up fast, and you’re already wondering what you could do to keep the happy gang of girlfriends busy! We tested and asked around among the moms we know, and we’ve put together a list of all the activities that were a real hit with girls aged 8 to 12.

1. Creative jewelry workshop - DIY: making pretty fabric bracelets or bracelets made with a cord and letter beads. The idea is for each of them to have the same message: “friends forever”, “BBF”, “Great friends”. They can keep it as a keepsake. Other variations exist, for example: personalizing a pencil case (with a raw canvas pencil case and “special textile” markers), painting photo frames with a group photo to print (with wooden or cardboard frames to decorate), personalizing a secret box (same principle: you buy a box and personalize it with paint, stickers, glitter, …).

2. Create a personalized T-shirt: the girls come up with a name and a logo. They can then decorate the T-shirt (paint and colored “special textile” markers). That way they’ll all have the same T-shirt for a little impromptu photo shoot. Each of them can keep the group photo and the T-shirt as a memento.

3. A “girly” workshop: a makeup class (a few eyeshadows, blush, lipstick…), kid-friendly nail polish and a few tattoos as a bonus. A fun workshop that’s fairly easy to organize and will delight the little princesses.

4. Karaoke: you can buy the equipment at a good price or simply rent it. If you’re on a tight budget, you’ll also find plenty of hits online (YouTube …) in karaoke versions. Then you’ll just need a microphone to plug into a speaker.

5. A cooking workshop: making pop cakes or colorful cupcakes (always a big success). You can find a multitude of tutorials online, and your best ally for inspiration will of course be Pinterest.

6. A fashion show with the most original costumes and a choreography.

7. A “Top Chef” contest in teams. A few challenges: the longest potato peel, making a recipe, a flavor game where different types of foods are tasted (don’t forget to make sure no one is allergic). You can choose several foods among these 4 types of flavors: sour flavors (e.g., a lemon, passion fruit, vinegar), bitter flavors (e.g., a piece of endive, a square of very dark chocolate), sweet flavors (e.g., jam, chocolate spread, honey, chocolate spread, purée), salty flavors (e.g., soy sauce, chips, fresh cheese, parmesan, salted butter).

8. A treasure hunt to do at home. There are ready-to-use treasure hunts. 

9. A bouncy castle: you have a garden and the birthday happens to fall during the nice season—renting a bouncy castle means hours of fun: moving around, letting off steam, bouncing, … there are many companies that deliver to your home.

10. A pajama party: an evening and a night with friends—the format is always a hit! Quite easy to organize, friends generally arrive around 6 p.m. and leave the next day around 10 a.m. On the program: making a pizza (each child makes their own pizza), an hour to eat and play, followed by a great movie with popcorn as a bonus. If you want to go all out, some companies offer and organize from A to Z absolutely magical “pajama parties”.

We also compiled the top activity ideas for a boy’s birthday aged 8 to 12.

And for the eternal question “what would she like for her birthday?”, don’t forget to make her gift list on Kadolog! She can gather all the gifts that would make her happy there. You can share it simply by providing the link to the list. It’s 100% free and super convenient.

Photo credit 1 cover: PEXELS - Ivan Samkov - Photo credit 2 article: vladimir-vasiliev