Nothing screams 90’s nostalgia like a glow in the dark/blacklight neon affair! When my naturally bouncing off the walls (then) 8-year-old niece wanted to have a dance party, I knew it had to have a retro feel. This party was held at a local dance studio and was a kid-modified 305 dance class…. but please believe it had me thinking about a traditionally 305-twerky dance party with my girlfriends! Either way, if you’re having your party at Mueva in Clarkston, you have to book Nicki Warner as your dance instructor, she’s the BEST!
Much of this party setup would also work for a roller skating party! Shoutout to my clever lover for Isabella’s bday tagline two years in a row “Mambo #9” (after Lou Bega’s classic, Mambo No. 5… not that you needed clarification!).
My favorite thing about this setup were these color-changing Illooms LED balloons from Party City! The actual balloons I listed aren’t available online (gasp), or in a multi-pack. You’ll have to go in store (big gasp) and buy them individually (I used 30x on a balloon strip @ $0.99 each), but these are a similar variety, they just don’t change color continuously. You pull a tab, air inflate, and they literally change color continuously from green to blue to purple. They were super cool and were still lit up almost a week later in my niece’s bedroom! The darker the area, the better they illuminate.
A close second were these UV/Blacklight Glow in the Dark plates, cups & utensils that worked SO well! They really illuminated under the blacklight, even in a medium dark setting. This set does NOT come with napkins though!
The disco ball stirrers were a post NYE clearance snag from a local grocery store, Kroger, but can be found here.
We set a normal folding table on top of exercise step-up risers and tucked a white table cloth under and had the girls sit on top of folded yoga blankets and a few poofs from home.
The light up crown headbands worked pretty well (only one finicky one in the batch of 12) and actually stayed on their heads while they danced.
The light-up box (pictured above) was from Justice, but this BBB Lightbox would fit nicely into the theme.
Coming in in third would be the glow in the dark body paint! We did simple application on the girls faces and it showed up very well.
I also bought these glow in the dark lotus/henna tattoos, but didn’t get around to applying them. If you buy these, let me know how they worked out in the comments below!
The foil balloon numbers were spray painted with Neon Martha Stewart spray paint (my goodness do I love spray paint). I hope you recycle your jumbo balloons by deflating them with a straw because 1) it’s good for the environment, and 2) they are expensive! That “9” is actually a flipped around “P” from a previous fête! Now for the craft…
Now my absolute favorite thing about this party was this adorable heart neon sign craft! I thought about doing a variety of shapes or first initials, but just did a heart for all in the spirit of Valentine’s Day. I will be posting the full tutorial shortly!
The cake was a small but dense cookie dough + brownie/chocolate cake hybrid with orange rock candy sprinkles, buttercream frosting, and Wilton cake color mist sprays. The neon battery operated heart was from HomeGoods and bedazzled with rock candy secured with cream cheese… VERY random and scrappy, I know.. .but the niece instantly noticed this cake was a bit more…petit than others in previous years (they’re spoiled but in my further defense the cake was very rich), so I did that to give it some elevated height. You can find a similar one at Target.
Don’t forget to have your guests wear neon colored clothing so that they really light up your party!
