The Last Dance: Tween Disco Party

Author: Sandra Foyt

28 Apr

It was supposed to be the last big birthday party. At eleven years of age, a girl should be too old for traditional birthday parties, right?

I always thought that the 10th Birthday Party should be the last big blast until the Sweet Sixteen Party. However, my daughter begged and pleaded, reminding me that this was her final year in elementary school. She convinced me that this would be her last chance to gather her friends before they moved on in middle school.

Well, since this was to be the last big party, I gave Kayla a lot of slack in planning the party. Twelve girls, overnight, OK, no problem. A Disco Dance Theme, alright, sounds like fun.

What I didn’t take into account is that fifth grade girls can be at varying stages of emotional development, and mostly, they aren’t so sweet and innocent anymore.

Not that these weren’t a good group of girls - they were - but in such large numbers, they egg each other on and the drama is probably inevitable.

Before blowing out the candles on her birthday cake, Kayla managed to catch the tablecloth on fire. This bit of pyrotechnics was minor in comparison to the emotional fireworks at the party.

Looking on, I didn’t really know what the private discussions were about, but for the girls involved they were intense. And, it seemed that over the course of the slumber party, there were several high-drama situations.

Overall, this was my least favorite birthday party. I prefer the fun, high-octane parties without the emotional roller-coaster.

In retrospect, the party would have been fine if we eliminated the overnight element.

11 Year Old Birthday - A Disco Dance Party

Before the party, we cleared out a room and turned it into a Disco Dance Club with a Mirrored Ball and foil streamers hanging from the ceiling.

We also set the stage for making music videos: an old camcorder; a pile of neon accessories (from Oriental Trading); and a Karaoke Machine for the sound tracks. That was a popular activity throughout the party.

The girls also loved creating their own, stylish T-shirt designs. I picked up a bunch of bright pink T-shirts at Michaels and a copy of Generation T: 108 ways to tranform a T-shirt. They cut and embellished their shirts until I’m not sure if you could even call them T-shirts anymore.

I had hoped that with all the dancing, singing, and a relaxing hot tub soak, that the girls would actually sleep. I even stayed with them until I thought they were all asleep. Most were. Some weren’t. In the morning, several woke up with magic marker writing on their faces.