I promise that sometime soon I'll stop talking about Aiden's birthday. This will (maybe?) be the last time, until next year. 😉 We had Devin's family over one day and my family over the next, since our TINY living room can't really handle large parties! Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves, and because we had smaller batches of people over, everyone got to spend more quality time with the birthday boy.
If you want a small, low-key party to have time to hang out with your family/friends, here's what you do:
1. Invite only family. Or whatever small, close-knit bunch live near you.
2. If "just family" still means 20+ people, then have two smaller parties. We had Devin's family over one day and my family over the next. That way, everyone got to have more time with Aiden (and because the parties were back to back, we only had to clean our house once, instead of cleaning it one weekend and again the next!)
2. Do cake and ice cream. That's it. (And mention it on the invite "Join us for cake & ice cream at 3pm..." so everyone knows what to expect.)
3. If you must offer food, make it in the crockpot. (3 pounds of chicken + 1 bottle of BBQ sauce + lots of rolls. There ya go. BBQ pulled chicken.)
4. No elaborate themes--just pick 1 color to be the "theme."
5. Skimp on decorations. I bought $3 tissue paper and made these tassels, which corresponded to the color of paper plates and the color of Aiden's shirt. Everyone complimented me on the pretty "decor" and color scheme, but it really only took like 20 minutes to make those garlands.
6. If you must decorate more, use pictures from their first year of life. 4x6 prints are inexpensive (and everyone will love seeing pictures of the little one grow from TINY newborn to active one-year-old!). My friend Courtney (who does Wild Cedar Co. with me!) did an incredible job taking pictures of Aiden, and his "picture day" outfit just happened to match the party's color scheme.
7. People are the reason you gather, so the most important thing is that you relax and enjoy your time with the friends/family.
What we spent (total, on 2 small parties):
$3 tissue paper for garlands (and there was tons of tissue paper left over!)
$3 printed photos
$5 Target cake stand for free with a coupon they mailed us
$12 of cake mix + frosting (2 cakes for us, 2 frostings, and a small cake mix for Aiden but he did nottt care about his cake at all!)
$6 ice cream
$15 drinks
$1 sort-of coordinating thank-you notes
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$40!!
Have you been to any fun birthday parties recently? (For kids or otherwise 😉 )
What we spent (total, on 2 small parties):
$3 tissue paper for garlands (and there was tons of tissue paper left over!)
$3 printed photos
$12 of cake mix + frosting (2 cakes for us, 2 frostings, and a small cake mix for Aiden but he did nottt care about his cake at all!)
$6 ice cream
$15 drinks
$1 sort-of coordinating thank-you notes
------------------
$40!!
Have you been to any fun birthday parties recently? (For kids or otherwise 😉 )
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