IT’S MAUI TIME! THE BOYS’ DISNEY MOANA BIRTHDAY PARTY

Enjoy our Maui Party for the boys – from the Disney Film Moana

Hey, friends! It only rained lightly this time as we celebrated our Disney Side at our sixth Disney Birthday Party in six years! We’ve had Disney Pixar’s “Up!“, Jake and the Neverland Pirates, Peter Pan, Frozen, Woody’s Wild West and now…. Maui. Not Moana – but Maui. From the moment he burst onto the screen, the boys were hooked. We were playing his song in the car, watching the DVD on repeat and I was applying temporary tattoos to their little arms and chests faster than I could keep the sponge wet. He’s become the boys’ hero despite his initial cheeky naughtiness in the film – and as soon as they had “real” fishhooks from Disney [the makeshift coathanger hooks they made got a bit scary for me], there were a hundred cries of “CHEEEEE-HOOOOOO” from the trampoline as our own mini-Mauis leapt through the air, shape-shifting in their little minds. It’s adorable, as Maui would say.

This Disney party turned out SO good – although looking back it was like a comedy of errors. Firstly, I managed to accidentally plan it for the final day of the exact week when we were lucky enough to have a little holiday, and so we had to cut our trip a day short – and then my hired help [read: Mom and Dad] were unable to come as Grandad got so poorly with Cancer. On the morning of the party whilst setting up by myself, I got all confused over which tables we were supposed to use outdoors and wasted about an hour in panic whilst steadily raising my blood pressure far higher than it needed to be, and…..I also managed to forget the birthday cake. How I did that is beyond me. The cake?! Daddy came to the rescue thankfully!

Luckily it all turned out fine in the end, and with the weather only letting the rainclouds have a little drizzle on the day compared to our usual outdoor celebrations [the worst being the torrential day-long downpour for Hero’s second Wild West Woody birthday BBQ at the beach] and the boys all had an amazing time. Our photo books that we made afterwards were gorgeous! We even came away with a little more of a sunkiss on our skins. Everyone was happy.

Maui Party Food

Maui and Moana Cookies

The food was so fun and so easy to theme for this party – we had decorated cookies from Sweet Charity, a lady who creates cookies and all proceeds go to a hospice which she supports – and they were amazing. Each guest had a personalised cookie with their name on [which you can see in the video] and then we had a selection of Maui tattoos, Moana Logos. Pua and Hei-Hei and the Moana Heart of Tefiti symbol, her Voyager raft, her dress and necklace and of course, the Fishhook. They were gorgeous and delicious.

Maui and Moana Rice Krispie Treats

You know how much I use Rice Krispie treats for everything, right? So this time I made things really simple for the Maui Party. I cut up the little bars and popped bamboo-designed straws in, to make them into little lollipops, and then added little foam frangipani flowers that I got from eBay or Etsy, I can’t remember which. The little decorations were very popular and got tucked behind everyone’s ears as they pretended to be an islander.

Maui and the Kakamora Cake Pops

My boys will eat nearly any food that’s on a stick, and cake pops might just be at the top of their list.

We couldn’t leave the Kakamora out of the Maui Party, especially since they’re so fearsome. These went SO fast. Haha. They were cute though, and filled with the best chocolate cake. I got a bite, Hero took pity on me.

Maui Marshmallow Pops

Marshmallow pops are a feature at all of our parties because they’re so easy to make and they’re loved by most children. All it takes is a bag of marshmallows, some straws or sticks,melted chocolate and sprinkles. I found the little dim sum bamboo boats on Amazon and popped one in each.

Decorating the Party Table

We were lucky to have big old wooden trestle tables that only needed a little bit of decorating – I popped to the florist and got a roll of the criss crossy flower wrapping fabric which is actually a tablecloth woven from coconut fibres [authentically Moana, you see] you can see in the photo for the food tables, and then for the actual party table I bought a couple of bunches of their tropical leaves and gerberas. They were around £5 for the leaves and around the same for the daisies, and covered a huge area. Moana sat on her boat in the middle and watched everyone wander around the buffet tables with her wayfinder plates, which were bamboo plates I got from a eco-store on the web.

On the menu this year also were pizza slices, chicken strips [poor Hei-Hei], sausage rolls [poor Pua], salad, pretzels and chocolate chip cookies, brownies, “Boat Snacks” – Maltesers, Disney Heart of Tefiti cereals, Cadbury Nibbles and Krave [a bit like puppy chow mix] in Disney Party Maui cups, crisps and Ocean swirl cupcakes with more plumeria flowers in different colours.

Party Decorations

Being outdoors, the party was easy to theme. We used the big wooden tables, hung coloured paper lanterns in the trees, and I hand made grass skirts for each of the tables. Making them myself cost way less than buying the stringy looking ones for a small fortune and it’s very therapeutic [although a little messy]. You can follow my tutorial If you look, you can see that the table says, “MAUI TIME” with the little snacks being in painted letter boxes from Hobbycraft.

We bought some decoupage letters, painted them brown and then drew Maui Tattoos with black Sharpie all over them to make the display. Again, these were so expensive on sites like Etsy but we made them for £3 each.

Around the party garden, the boys were practically bursting to see their Disney friends come to life – Huge Maui figures, Baby Moana from the Animators’ Collection with her Sandy Toes and teeny turtle, and a cuddly plush Pua and crazy looking Hei-Hei were sitting happily on the tables.

We stayed as authentic and true to the island as possible, using bamboo plates and we also had little plates which were made from leaves that were sewn together cleverly. We couldn’t not have Moana plates too, and Maui cups, and balloons…and Moana on her canoe sailing down the dining table! Our sweet little birthday cake was served to our guests with shrieks of delight from little people who wanted to save their plate and napkin “FOREVER”. It was so lovely seeing them all so happy.

Party Entertainment

I’ll spare you the photos of me on the huge inflatable slide, because I’m kind. Entertainment at this kind of party is SO easy. There is NOTHING better than wide open space when you’re little – and when you’re a grown up too. The big people all relaxed together in the huge Scouting field whilst the little people ran safe and free, and bounced down and over huge inflatables from Ross at our trusty bouncy castle party favourites, BounceBiz, who arrive every year on time and have never, ever let us down. If you see a castle, slide or pool on our blog, we’ve hired it from them.

Every parent came to say how relaxed the party was – I laughed when one of the moms told me that she usually can’t run fast enough after dropping her son off at a party, but she had stayed at ours for the whole three hours, and loved it!

Party Drinking Bottles – a Handy Tip

Whenever we have a party, there are quite a few children there who are all thirsty and always forget where they put their cup. To save on this happening, I bought these tropical coconut trees [“consider the coconut!” – Moana’s Dad] for £1 each from the Range, and attached a name tag to each one. No one lost theirs and everyone had a souvenir to take home too.

Maui Costumes

Sadly there’s usually a real lack of Disney costuming for boys – but I managed to find little shorts and t-shirt sets on Ali Express. They were so soft and with elasticated waistbands which means they could run about to their heart’s content. The ShopDisney Fishhooks completed the look. Their cousin had a handmade costume by my sister who sews far better than I do.

Party Favours

The party favours this year were a mix of useful items – we bought little Moana and Maui drawstring bags for every guest, the kind that you use for PE kits, and gave everyone a plastic coconut tree drink bottle which were loved by everyone! Every time I saw a tree bottle I kept hearing “Consider the Coconut!” in my head [that song is my favourite]. There were lots and lots of Swizzels sweeties as they’re a huge favourite – and which kept making the boys giggle as they have lollipops called “Drumstick” which is what Maui calls Hei-Hei in the film if you’re not already completely immersed in the world of Moana and Friends. There was a three tiered pick and mix of their sweeties which held mini figures of Hei-Hei and Pua peeping over the side, and a tray of little sweetie cones I’d made up – and I made little grass skirts from some of the sweetie jars with drumsticks popped into them. It was our most popular stand ever with the little ones – even more so with the naughty parents who seemed to like standing right next to it.

Birthday Cake

Yes, I forgot it. No idea how I managed that one, especially if you know who much I obsess over their cakes, but I did. I blame being relaxed on holiday. SO, Gav did a quick run to the Co-op, which is the only shop for miles around, and came back with a suitably colour themed cake to save the Happy Birthday song from being really weird for everyone.