Chacham's Journal: Verbiage: Birthday in a Box, and musical birthday cards.

Yesterday, i gave a friend a birthday present. It was an idea i've used once before. Take a carboard box and put a cake and a present inside, add a couple helium balloons, and get a musical birthday card (or the thingy therein) attached to the flap of the box. When the birthdayee opens the box, out come the baloons to the sound of music, and a cake and present. "Birthday in a Box" :)

The only problem this time was, finding a musical birthday card. The local Hallmark stores didn't have them, and neither did a few other stores i checked. I ended up settling for a card that played a few seconds of "Don't Worry Be Happy" which seemed the most innocuous of the bunch. It wasn't the same as that cheesy happy birthday tune.

I'm going to need to search now for where to buy the cards, to be prepared for future tries. It just seemed so obvious to me that *everyone* would carry a musical card section. Oh well.

I wonder. Is there any way to add to the Birthday in a Box idea? Such as streamers or the like? I don't think it'd be "too much" as i think the best part is that on the outside it's a plain, inconspicuous, cardboard box. On the inside though, it's a party.

i can think of a few.

[SolemnDragon]

tie the helium balloons together and place a lot of streamers on top- you'll have to try a few times and might want to use curling ribbon as streamers, because you want it light enough to float but unstable enough to fall off the balloons when they rise.

Another option is to put a fan in the box, with a battery, and face it upwards, make it so the opening lid flips the switch, blowing the confetti and streamers upwards, but that sounds like more work than i'd put in.

Add paper hats. Every party needs pape

Re:i can think of a few.

[Chacham]

tie the helium balloons together and place a lot of streamers on top- you'll have to try a few times and might want to use curling ribbon as streamers, because you want it light enough to float but unstable enough to fall off the balloons when they rise.

Nice idea. Perhaps.....

Another option is to put a fan in the box, with a battery, and face it upwards, make it so the opening lid flips the switch, blowing the confetti and streamers upwards, but that sounds like more work than i'd put in.

That actually

fan

[SolemnDragon]

it wouldn't take much- maybe you could modify one of the chep plastic deals they sell during the summer for a couple of buck- you know, the handheld battery powerd kind? cover it with wire mesh. Another option would be to rig some sort of plunger-device so that opening the lid forces air into a tube to shoot the streamers up.

Another option, of course, would be simply to fill the top of the box with crepe streamers so that the ballons flost up through it as through a net. Try it a few times and see how muc

Re:fan

[SolemnDragon]

Oh, and it might be nice to include some kind of birthday candles and a lighter, too.

Re:fan

[Chacham]

All interesting ideas. I think i will have to come back to this JE should i try to do it again.

The birthday candles and lighter is cute. Though, i'd love to see a way of automatically (and safely!) lighting them on the openning.