Things You'll Need:
- Roll of brown wrapping paper
- Scissors
- Clear tape
- Roll of bright floral wrapping paper
- Household glue
- Clear fishing line
- Brightly-colored crepe paper streamers
- Needle and thread
- Yardstick
- Pencil
- Thumbtacks
- Large sheets of cardboard
- Poster paint
- Brushes
- Ironing board
- Bright green plastic tablecloth
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Step 1
Measure the height of your buffet table, then add 2 inches to the total. Unroll the brown wrapping paper to this measurement and cut the paper from the roll. Fold that extra 2 inches down and crease it along the long edge of the brown wrapping paper. This gives you a stopping point as you cut the rest of the piece of brown paper into long, narrow strips. Tape the 2-inch margin to the top of the table and let the long strips hang down for a grass skirt effect. Repeat these steps until you have as many sides of the buffet table covered as you want. Cover the top of the buffet table with lengths of the bright floral wrapping paper, and tape it down too.
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Step 2
Buy colorful crepe paper streamers and cut them into 2-foot lengths. Cut scallops along one edge of each short streamer with scissors. Then take needle and thread to match the streamer color and sew a running stitch on the other side. Gather this tightly and knot the thread. Glue the 2 ends of the gathered streamer together to finish forming each brightly-colored Hawaiian flower. Put flowers at the base of the punchbowl and as a centerpiece on the buffet table.
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Step 3
Get some large sheets of cardboard or a refrigerator or cabinet door cardboard carton. Split open the glued edges of the cardboard box seam by carefully sliding a blunt spackling spatula or metal ruler between the edges, and pull the 2 sides apart. Flatten out the cardboard on the floor, and put the ironing board on top of it. Draw around the ironing board with a soft lead pencil. Cut this form out, cut the narrow end a little shorter, paint it with bright poster paints, and you've got a surfboard to put up on the wall.
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Step 4
Use another piece of the same cardboard carton and draw around a guitar-shaped cake pan. Paint it brown, glue some of your colorful flowers around the sound hole, and you've got a ukulele to put on the wall too. Borrow a library book or find tropical fish pictures on the Internet, and cut fish shapes from cardboard. Paint them in bright colors and hang from the party room's ceiling, using clear fishing line tied to thumbtacks.
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Step 5
Upholstery shops sometimes have long cardboard tubes used to store bolts of upholstery material. If you can get one or two of these, paint the tubes with brown poster paint and let them dry. If you can't get the rolls, use flat cardboard painted brown.
Then take a plastic tablecloth in bright green and cut out long palm leaf shapes from it. Glue the ends of these leaves to the top of the cardboard tree truck. If you have an old tennis ball, paint it brown too. Once it's dry, glue it to the middle of the leaves. Now you have an indoor palm tree with a coconut in the middle of its fronds. Put the end of the palm tree in a tub of rocks to hold it upright. Or use fishing line strung from the top edge of the palm tree to the ceiling to keep it straight.
