The Healthy Pinata Challenge: Birthday Ideas
July 11th 2007 by Dr.MOZ in Birthday Parties, Healthy Events, Healthy Kids
Dear Dr.MOZ,
Here’s a challenge for you. I have an outdoor birthday party brewing for a six-year old, and the birthday girl wants a piñata. I love the piñata idea, but I’m not a big fan of feeding ten kids candy from a piñata and then watching them shovel down a birthday cake. Any ideas on how I can make the piñata healthy without disappointing a group of kids expecting candy?
Thanks,
Margaret
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Hi Margaret,
I’ll admit that this was a tough one. We obviously don’t want a piñata full of broccoli and bran, but packing it full of toys will most likely result in broken pieces by the time the piñata is cracked. My answer for the world’s first healthy AND fun piñata…drum roll please, the treasure-hunt piñata! Here’s my six step recipe for success:
(1) Create ten “gift packs” (one for each guest) that would include the usual party favors and any treats (toys, noise makers, art supplies, etc) that you feel would be more healthy than candy. Place the individual children’s names on the gift packs.
(2) Wrap them into one “mega gift” box and hide it somewhere close to the birthday site, preferably in an outdoor location where it won’t be stolen or ravaged by a pack of wild dingos.
(3) Working backwards from the final “mega gift” location, create a sequence of hints that will lead the group from hint to hint until they could track it from step one (the piñata). You’ll have to guess on how difficult to make the hints but as a rule-of-thumb, try and make the entire search something that would take about 10 minutes. Anything longer will slowly become a buzz-kill, so plan your treasure hunt accordingly.
(4) Wrap each tip in something fun (shiny boxes, plastic capsules, etc) and hide them each in safe locations. The tips will need to be in the correct sequence to ensure that treasure hunters can work their way to each step, so don’t take this step lightly.
(5) The first tip will go into the piñata. This should be a single piece of paper or art (decorate for effect) cut up into ten pieces. Each piece will go into a small box with the names of the ten children on each. The boxed tips will then be packed into the piñata.
(6) When the piñata is eventually broken and the boxes fall out, the party goers will soon realize that their individual pieces will need to come together to create a single message. The treasure hunt has begun!
The great thing about the treasure hunt piñata, is that it merges two great group activities in one and it doesn’t require packing kids full of sugar. They’ll remain active for the duration of the event, and they’ll need to work together to find the birthday booty. Thanks for the great question Margaret!
Have fun and stay healthy,
Dr.MOZ
July 11th, 2007 at 1:42 pm
What a great idea!!! I love the treasure hunt idea. I teach nutrition to kids so your idea of how to “healthify” the pinata is greatly appreciated. Thanks for posting it Doc! I agree, being the realist that I am, that kids probably won’t get excited when salad ingredients start to fall out of a pinata. Other options for prizes can be pencils, kids jump ropes, stickers, bike water bottles, glop, silly putty, game cards (pokemon, old maid) etc. Have the birthday girl write a wish list for some pinata contents. She will have a better idea of what her peers would be into. I have gone to dollar stores and bought tons of kid prizes for around $15. Good luck and have fun!
July 11th, 2007 at 3:20 pm
Thanks for the “thumbs up” on today’s healthy pinata challenge. That means a lot coming from a nutrition teacher!
Tell your students that Dr.MOZ said hello!
Best,
Dr.MOZ
June 8th, 2008 at 5:53 pm
This is a wonderful idea. My nephews birthday is coming up and we have yet to think up an activity as great as this one. Thanks for the help!
June 23rd, 2008 at 4:23 pm
That’s a really good idea to keep the kidos occupied for a while. I’m throwing my daughter her very 1st birthday in August. I don’t really have a ‘theme’, but I do have a goal. I’m trying to make it a Green/Earth Friendly party. In the pinata I will be putting orgainic lollipops from www.yummyearth.com. (Yes, they are Yummy) And I will be adding orgainic chocolates from a fair trade certified company called www.sweetearthchocolates.com. I’m also going to be throwing in some animal cookies, and orgainc chocolate chip cookies you can get at any Sun Harvest or Whole Food Store. My little Ava is getting fussy (she’s teething) so I have to go..!
July 26th, 2008 at 9:20 pm
This is just what I was looking for, I too was feeling bad because I didn’t know if I should just do what everyone does and get a pinata full of candy and then eat cake and all the other stuff…people just expect that kind of thing, even if its not healthy for kids. Thanx again
August 18th, 2008 at 7:24 am
Kids love Pinatas! Slightly concerned about the clubbing-animals aspect of this game, but it’s all good clean fun really
August 21st, 2008 at 7:17 am
dear dr. moz,
i think you are completely ridculous, i mean the point of the pinata is to get candy! you guys are worried about things not being healthy, but get real its a birhtday party! let the kids have fun and enjoy the sweets for at least one day. i think the ideas you came up with are so stupid, what about parties with 15-30 kids? you really think a little scavenger hunt is gonna keep them all entertain? you proubly need to go back to school or somthing because you dont know nothing about kids, how many do you have?
August 21st, 2008 at 11:01 am
Hi Maria,
It’s always great to get a post from a super-fan, but it appears that you may have missed the point of this particular post. People write “Dear Dr.MOZ” letters for ideas on specific topics and as you’ll see from Margaret’s letter above, she was looking for piñata ingredients (other than candy) for exactly ten kids.
I decided to take your advice and have more kids while going back to school, and you’ll never guess what I learned! Apparently, many cultures already do fill piñatas with toys instead of candy. Others, like the Aztecs were known to paint faces of gods on clay pots, fill them with water, and break them. I don’t recommend this for birthday parties of 15-30, but let us know how it goes if you give it a try.
~ Dr.MOZ
September 2nd, 2008 at 4:39 am
I love pinata.. I make it as a cocktail in parties and people just love it. Well Dr.Moz, not sure if that was what you are looking for for the kids but here it is.
Ingredients
5 oz. Pineapple Juice
1 1/2 oz. Jose Cuervo Tequila
Mixing Instruction
Garnish with fresh pineapple.
Hope I helped somehow..
September 4th, 2008 at 3:04 am
Pinata Parties are extremely popular, and I like some of the ideas here to make the process longer, and healthier for the kids.