We just had Adrian's b'day party at home (he was 3 in December) and I stuck to the 1 kid for each age year, 3 years old. 3 guests. It really worked well for us and 1 parent was required to stay. We had it on a Saturday afternoon from 2:00 - 4:00 (after the lunch time so no major food needed to be served
). We had a fireman theme and each child actually came dressed up (not required but the kids had a ball doing it). The favors were little fire trucks and we invited a "real" firefighter from our local fire station to come and speak to the kids about safety in the home and the car, stranger danger etc. during the last hour. We saved the cake (actually made the ice cream cone cupcakes, very little mess and the kids loved eating the whole thing) for the time when the fireman was going to be there so they would be more attentive and they were all very enthralled with him because he also came dressed for the part. We also handed out coloring books and crayons on fire safety at the end of the presentation. They were really cute and really asked some very good questions. Things really went great and not much chaos due to how we scheduled the activites. It was fun and I had coffee and cookies for the mom's that stayed. Have fun!