Woman Shares The Slumber Party Plan She Made When She Was 8 And 220k People Love It
Interview With Author
Having a party as a kid, whether it’s for a birthday or just a simple sleepover, used to be one of the most exciting things ever. You’d invite all of your best friends, play together, watch television, gossip and giggle, snack on things like pizza or mom’s homemade snacks, stay up longer, and whatnot.
Well, cartoonist and writer Emily Flake, with whom Bored Panda got in touch, recently found a slumber party plan that she wrote when she was 8 years old and decided to share it with the lovely people of the internet. And the party sounds both adorable and amazing!
Ever organized a slumber party when you were 8? This woman did, and she even found her old party plan!
Image credits: Emily Flake
So, Emily Flake, a cartoonist, writer, performer, teacher, and illustrator from… well, the internet, but also from Brooklyn, New York, recently stumbled upon a very detailed slumber party plan that she composed back when she was 8 years old.
And boy, was it detailed! It had everything from a modest guest list—assuming it’s for best friends only—to a slew of activities, each time-stamped to the minute. No joke, some activities are just 1–3 minutes long and some activities start or end at odd times, like a minute or two after an hour or half an hour.
We asked Emily if she still remembers how she came up with this idea—was she always so organized and making a plan was the natural thing to do, or was she encouraged by someone, did anyone help her with it? She said this:
“Oh God, no—I was an extremely scatterbrained and disorganized child, but I loved making these kinds of plans as an exercise in fantasy play. As I recall I also made club charters and magazines like this, but it was more of an extension of imagining the best-case scenario for a thing I wanted to do. And people who were kids in the 80s will understand that this is not the sort of thing one’s parents helped with, unless you somehow managed to break an arm writing it.”
What makes it super adorable are all of the cute spelling mistakes and the activities that, face it, you’d still want to partake in at a slumber party
Image credits: Emily Flake
The plan starts off with a list of guests (sorry, geusts), namely five: Kristen, Amanda, Heather, Sarah, and Darce. Then it moves on to the itinerary, beginning with the arrival of the guests and the party practically starts in all of its adorableness.
Besides all of the cute spelling errors that you’d expect from an 8-year-old, there’s also all of the adorable stuff that the ladies got to do: talking and giggling, making funny faces and remarks, drawing pictures, more giggling, a whole lot of reading, playing various games, dancing, pillow fighting, and “lying around talking about how some things are so mean.” Of course!
The supposed party was to start at around 4:30PM on one day, continue into the night until it’s time for the girls to sleep (at about 1:30AM) until whenever they wake up, but no later than 10AM when they have breakfast and that’s where the plan cuts off. Assuming it’s probably the time when the parents come to pick up their kids. Or not. The party can go on, right?
When asked what is her favorite part in this party plan and if she was to throw a party today, would there be anything she would definitely include from this list, she said this:
“[It’d be] a toss-up between ‘making funny faces and making remarks,’ and ‘lying around talking about how some things are soooooo mean.’ I would absolutely include both of these activities in any post-pandemic get-together, and if we’re being honest, they form a significant part of my joke-writing process.”
These include giggling, pillow fights, making remarks, and “talking about some things that are so mean”
Image credits: Emily Flake
Emily shared her adorable slumber party plan with the internet on her Twitter with the caption: “I’ve never planned a better party than the one I planned when I was 8.” True that, Emily, true that!
People on Twitter loved it and had a lot to say about this slumber party of hers. Many were pointing out all of the fun things included into the plan, like “make remarks,” “make funny faces,” and “playing shrades.” Yes, that’s how charades are actually spelled, don’t you dare disagree with an 8-year-old!
Others highlighted the fact that there are three dedicated pillow fights, each anywhere from 30 to 60 minutes long (poor pillows), the fact that there is a total of 1 hour and 16 minutes dedicated to reading in total, and the fact that dad takes everyone out for donuts and that lasts just 19 minutes.
The tweet went viral immediately, garnering over 220,000 likes with over 14,000 retweets in just one day. This came as a huge surprise for Emily, as she herself explains: “[I was] absolutely taken by surprise. I thought it was cute, but people really seemed to respond to it—I think because we’re all missing any kind of communal in-person activity right now. And because of the pillow fites.”
After the photos went viral, Emily also shared a video of what her 8-year-old thought of her party plan
To make things even more fun and adorable, Emily also shared a video of herself interviewing her own actual 8-year-old daughter and asking what she thought about her childhood party. Yes, she would actually want to go, but things would probably be a little different: less pillow fights, different snacks, and no hauling the radio “because this was made in the 80s.”
Unfortunately, Emily can’t remember if she actually had the party, so it might have just never happened, but her daughter said she would do many of the things in the list for her own party, so, hey, it might still become a reality!
But let’s humor this idea of the party becoming a reality: we asked Emily if she was still 8 years old and would be organizing this party, is there anything that she would change in the plan? She had this to say: “[It’d be] more time allocated to funny faces/remarks, perhaps, and less time for pillow fites? I was maybe running out of steam by the time I got to that time slot, but looking over or that’s an awful lot of pillow battling. That said, I more or less stand behind this entire run of show document.
She concluded: “I just hope we’re all able to have this kind of fun again soon. I’d honestly love to run this party at least once in 2021 myself, either with current friends or the four of the five girls from the original document I’m still in touch with (Heather KNOWS WHAT SHE DID).”
If you’re interested, Emily has an entire website dedicated to her work, as well as a Twitter and Instagram that you can also follow. But before you go, tell us your thoughts on this! Would you participate in this party if you were still 8 years old, or would you throw a party with these exact activities? (Heck, even as an adult!) Let us know in the comment section below!
People online absolutely adored the party plan, pointing out the best parts and how much they’d want to attend
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Wow! They stay up later than I do! :) (I know, it's a special occasion but I go to bed very early lol)
Wow! They stay up later than I do! :) (I know, it's a special occasion but I go to bed very early lol)
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