Kate's Colorful Crayon Birthday Party

***WARNING: Looooooong post--even for me! LOL!***


Kate turned 3 earlier this month, and she had a few celebrations to commemorate the big event. The first one was colorful crayon-themed birthday party, which was held at home over the July 4th weekend. The crayon theme worked out well because she loves crayons and paint and art and drawing and coloring, etc. I thought it made a cute theme for a toddler, and it was fun finding decorations and other goodies for her party. I found a lot of inspiration from another blog, and I wanted to share what we did in case someone out there finds it helpful (and, of course, to document Kate's party). :o)

Invitation

The invitation, kind of. Life was pretty busy leading up to Kate's party, and invitations never got mailed. So I ended up e-mailing this photo to Kate's friends, inviting them to come and celebrate. I remember seeing a concept kind of like this on terriblespeller's blog a while back. (Thanks, Angela!)

Decorations
When your theme is colors and/or crayons, decorations and accessories can be pretty easy. :o)


The sweets table. Tablecloth is from Old Navy, and the birthday banner is from Michaels.


Cake/hat/plate/napkin table. Hats, plates and napkins are all from Target. My sister had bought several of these bright-colored buckets at Target, and I used them as balloon weights. I think we put a can drink inside the bucket to hold it down. The balloons are from one of those box kits with a little helium tank--I got one at Wal-Mart. A lot cheaper and more convenient than having to go buy balloons right before the party and then transport them home, etc.


I ordered a bunch of these inflatable crayons off of eBay--they are very inexpensive and lots of fun! We have used them as pool toys--and after the party I gave several to my SIL, a kindergarten teacher, to use in her classroom decor. I see that red crayon on the end got turned a little, as did one of the pink ones.


Here are some more we put out by the front door.


Mr. X greets guests.


I ordered this pinata but decided to use it as a decoration rather than an actual pinata. I'll save the pinata activity for another day ...


Outside, more balloons and another banner give a festive feel to the deck.


Another place to eat for those who'd rather be outdoors. The weather was really nice that morning--not too hot (yet). YAY!

Activity Table

As guests arrived, they could color at the dining room table. I bought a couple of those rolls of big coloring sheets at Michaels. The kids really seemed to like them. Yay!


Coloring fun!


I also bought these fun photo cards that feature animals with cut-out faces on both sides. They are really cute!


I bought these at Hallmark. If you know me, then you know this stuff is right up my alley.

Balloon Drop

OK, this was a HUGE hit. Who knew? I saw it on the blog I mentioned above and thought we could give it a try. I had the balloons already (from Michaels--got them on clearance for 25 cents a pack!), and I bought the net at Michaels, too. I would recommend getting a bigger net--I think bird netting has been recommended--but I didn't have a lot of time to find something. This ended up working out OK. Tanna rigged it up a couple of nights before the party, and we kept an eye on it, hoping it all wouldn't fall before the big balloon drop. I had already been blowing up balloons for the drop, and I worked on them for a few days when I had a free minute.


Everyone gathered in the entry area and waited for the big drop. We counted down from 10--it was a lot of fun! Funny story: Everyone was waiting and ready to go right when the pizza guy showed up. So we were delayed by a few minutes, but everyone was very patient. It added to the anticipation. At least, that's what I like to think.


The kids LOVED it! They played with the balloons for the rest of the party--and Kate and her cousins played with them even after the party was over.

Water Balloon Toss

After the balloon drop, we headed outside for a water-balloon toss! YAY! The banner is from Michaels, the froggie pool-turned-balloon-holder from Wal-Mart, and the water balloons from Target. I had no idea how challenging filling water balloons can be! I made quite a mess before Tanna took over this project. hahaha!


The Birthday Girl giving it a go ...


The kids seemed to really enjoy this, although some of the balloons didn't bust on first impact. I ended up going inside to get the pizza ready, but before it was all over they were throwing them on the rocks and at a little elephant statue thing out back. LOL! (I believe this was my husband's idea.)

Cake, Cupcakes & Food

I am a sucker for sweets! We had just a few things, but just enough ... cupcakes, Pixie Stix, lollipops (ordered from Oriental Trading, by the way), and M&Ms.


We had fun and yummy cupcakes (made by our friend Amy) with crayon picks (ordered off of eBay). Kate especially loved the sprinkles.


And check out Kate's crayon cake! This also was made by our friend Amy, and it was so cute--not to mention delicious!


Blowing out the candles--which I found at Ingles in Tennessee, by the way--was one of Kate's favorite things about her birthday. She still talks about it. She also will sing the birthday song and tell you to blow out the candles--or she will do it herself. LOL!


Group shot (kind of)--thanks, everyone!

Treat Bags & Thank-You Notes

The treat bags included several Crayola goodies that I found at Michaels for only 25 cents each! I bought a ton of them for Operation Christmas Child. When I got home, I was sorting everything and realized what cute party favors they would make as well (even though we hadn't decided on doing a crayon-themed birthday party yet). I figured I could always give more to OCC if we didn't end up using them, so off I went to Michaels again to buy even more! The people there probably thought I was nuts buying up so much stuff (and for so cheap), but I don't care!


Anyway, inside the treat bags were: Crayola crayons tin, pack of 24 crayons, two Crayola notepads, three crayon-shaped bandages, little pack of Crayola crayon-shaped note cards, mini scrapbook, cupcake stickers, two little canisters of Play-Doh, and three lollipops.


The favors were packaged inside multi-colored goodie bags, which were tied closed with a ribbon (red for girls, and blue for boys). I also attached a little crayon card to the ribbon with a note inside thanking guests for coming.


The thank-you notes. I ran these through the printer myself (yay for getting it to line up right--LOL!) and wrote personal notes on the back. I found the address labels on VistaPrint.

Family
Here are a few family photos from the day ...









Happy birthday, Kate! We love you, Birthday Girl! XOXO

P.S. A special thank you to Jane and to my family for taking photos--some of these photos are theirs, by the way. :o)