Parents spend hours worrying about the theme of the party; carefully curated color patterns to go with the decorations, the cupcakes match the napkins which match the banner, which matches the favorite character or concept of the birthday kid at that moment.
But in reality – if you ask kids what they remember from parties they went to last year, 98% of them won’t remember the decorations.
But they remember that magician who made their friend’s shoe disappear. They remember getting to hold that snake. They remember that potato sack relay race in which they fell over laughing.
Children and adults celebrate differently, and the sooner parents acknowledge what actually keeps engagement, the less money and time they waste in creating a Pinterest-perfect party.
The Attention Span Acknowledged But No One Calls Out
Children have a different brain timeline than an adult brain. A five-year-old has an attention span of 10-15 minutes maximum for any one activity.
Yet parents throw two-hour parties with one or two activities and hope that kids will all play naturally for the remainder.
But this is where things fall apart. Kids do not play naturally in a wholesome, combined manner without direction.
They get fidgety, and then rambunctious, and before you know it, someone starts crying because another child took their party favor, and now the parent turned party planner is playing referee instead of celebrating.
Professional entertainment helps avoid all of this nonsense – not to mention how decorations do absolutely nothing to reinvigorate a lagging party.
When parents hire trusted kids party entertainers Adelaide families recommend, they bring someone on board who understands how to engage children across different age groups and maintain their energy and attention throughout the entire event.
These professionals know how to read a room, adapt when something’s not going well and keep all eyes on the prize – even if they start wandering.
Why Passive Entertainment Doesn’t Work
It’s easy enough for parents to believe that if they put on a movie or set up a craft station, that’ll be enough. And maybe for 10 minutes. If they’re lucky, 15. Yet children live in an increasingly overstimulated world.
They have hands-on games at home, instant feedback on technology driven activities and responsive devices.Putting them in front of a screen at a party is what they do every day at home. They want something different. Something special.
Now, that doesn’t mean children have to hire a trapeze act (although I’m sure that would work) but it does mean that passive entertainment rarely works like hands-on experiences.
Successful elements feature common characteristics: movement – because kids have pent-up energy from running around; surprise – because if they’ve seen what’s coming, they’re bored; and opportunity to wow others – because when kids get excited because they completed a goal (or encouraged others to), excitement radiates across everyone else.
The Social Element
Most people wouldn’t assume kids are socially aware – but they are. Children in a party setting notice when some are engaged and others are not. This creates unnecessary tension for an otherwise celebratory experience.
For example, those bored or actively removed from engaging lashed out because they were frustrated; those trying to engage felt guilty or defensive or overwhelmed; the birthday child was stressed under the pressure of entertaining everyone.
Good entertainment engages without exception. This is not as easy as it sounds – children arrive with different levels of shyness and extroversion and comfort levels.
A five-year-old doesn’t want to be called out to do something in front of everyone; an eight-year-old is getting bored with a stationary game because it moves too slowly.
Entertainment professionals are masters at this – with years’ experience in handling various temperaments in myriad settings. They’ve seen it all – they can appeal or defer without offense like most parents can’t.
The Takeaway
Engaging activities are exhausting! It requires constant excitement and direction, and most parents underestimate how tiring it’ll be with everything else like cutting cake, yelling at kids to turn around for pictures, welcoming parents dropping off kids, etc.
When the hosting parent assumes the role of entertainer, something always gets sacrificed: either the engagement falters because they’ve spread themselves too thin or the other components fall by the wayside because they’ve put too much effort into that one specific area for engagement.
Ultimately, hiring professionals makes all components go smoother – the parent can actually talk to other adults for ten seconds let alone happily cut a cake while watching their children enjoy themselves (instead of being in crisis mode).
What They Remember Years Later
When you ask adults about parties they held as children – and let’s be honest – they either remember one or two moments very clearly.
Nobody remembers what napkins looked like – but they recall how impressively the entertainer made balloon animals; they remember how they got to pet all of the animals at the petting zoo party; they remember how the treasure map made them run through the entire backyard.
They remember activity – not decorations – and not only relative significance or relevance, but time based potential – which did more with less than anything adult-themed ever could with time put into aesthetics.
Children do not care if their parties are Pinterest-perfect down to every nuance. They want something to share with their friends that they’d never done before – and if it’s done prior (like sitting still for another movie), they’re even more let down.
Social Media Only Shares Photos (Not Experiences)
There’s definitely social media pressure to have things look Instagram-worthy for others – but children do not experience parties through a camera lens (or even through their parent’s lens).
They experience it first-hand by participating, exciting themselves – and generating an electricity of sorts with those around them.
This isn’t saying parents who do decorations are doing anything wrong – but insteads acknowledge that maybe everything spent on decor could be applied differently toward engagement and everyone, including children who live in the moment, would be much happier.
Guilt surrounds party planning; parents want to outdo one another each year per elaborate expectations; but ultimately no child thinks love is measured by themed napkins per party but love is measured by how celebrated they felt while doing something awesome they’ll remember.
Deciding instead to value fun over decor on who uses the napkins as an excuse to take the easier route isn’t easy – but instead it’s smart for what children value.
Once parents realize the pressure is off regarding aesthetics and value instead momentum it’s overwhelmingly relieving.
Ultimately, figuring out what keeps children’s interest at a party means parents don’t have to worry about Pinterest perfection but instead what’s actually going on at those wildly successful parties where kids loved themselves so much they weren’t bored stiff enough to care about decor placement in a picture for later sharing.