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A Well Crafted Kid

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This year’s birthday party was scheduled between in the mid-afternoon, after lunch time and before dinner. I wanted to keep the food simple and didn’t want to worry about a lot of food getting wasted. Toddlers are notoriously picky eaters!

My menu for this event was pretty simple: fruit, veggies, cake, and ice cream. True to form, I still wanted to match the party food up to the theme a little. That is the beauty of having a town-themed party though… you can build your town around your menu and activities!

I found cute little french fry containers at Target and instantly new we had to have a Fast Food restaurant with a healthy twist. So, the fast food restaurant served veggie sticks as french fries. We then built a bakery to house the cupcakes and an ice cream truck to serve the ice cream. We built a cafe for the beverages and served water or juice in disposable coffee cups. My son was thrilled to be walking around with a coffee cup like his daddy.

Veggie Stick French Fries

 

Town Themed Party Cafe

Juice Served in Coffee Cups for Kid's Beverage Option

Town Themed Birthday Party Ice Cream Truck

More Town Themed Party Food Ideas:

  • Sandwiches— Set up a deli for the kiddos to play in or to house deli sandwiches.
  • Meals— Create a replica of your favorite restaurant and serve little meals on table cloth covered cardboard box tables.
  • Cake Pops— These can go in a bakery setting, or you can get really creative and decorate the cake pops to match your town’s businesses. You could make little cakepops that look like basketballs, footballs, or baseballs and put them in the town’s athletic store.
  • Candy— Create a candy shop for your little’s to shop at!
  • Fruit— A cute little fruit stand or market would be a great place for the kids to shop for their snacks.
  • Lemonade— Let the kiddos play in and serve lemonade from a lemonade stand.

The list goes on and on!

What would you serve at a town themed party?

Photos taken by family photographer Macey Snelson of Moments by Macey (formerly Motormouth Studios).

I can’t even believe it… but, it almost time for us to be celebrating my son’s second birthday! It really feels like his first birthday was just a hop and a skip ago. Yet, next month my munchkin is turning two!

Party Inspiration for a Second Birthday Party:

I’m not ready for this big day AT ALL. I seriously have been planning one party in my head for about three months and then decided to switch it up entirely two days ago. YIKES. The things I do have set in stone are the color scheme and the invitations. Just need to pop those suckers in the mail! (I received invitations free of charge from Tiny Prints to feature in my upcoming party. They are gorgeous!)

Second Birthday Inspiration Board
Invites from Tiny Prints / How to Make a Party Hat via Oh Happy Day / Cardboard Playhouses via A Beautiful Mess

So, I’m obviously keeping it simple this year. As much as I like big crazy birthday parties… I have a two-year-old that still wakes up at night. I am not going to be able to go crazy. We’ll be having the birthday party with friends in our backyard. Our food plans are pretty simple as well— birthday cake, fruit, veggies, and popsicles (or ice cream, haven’t decided that one.)

Second Birthday Party Activities:

I’ve had a thousand and one ideas for themes and fun decor ideas. But, I’ve been totally stumped on the activities. (I didn’t do so bad on his first birthday activities.) Seriously though, I can’t wrangle one two-year-old to do a structured activity. How am I supposed to wrangle several? Thankfully, I have very smart friends! I asked Twitter to give me some two-year-old party activity ideas and got this awesome response:

two year old birthday activity idea via twitter

I then put the two-year-old party activity question up on Facebook and got some super ideas: 

  • “Last year we did dinosaur train (PBS show – it’s genius by the way). I made salt dough Dinosaurs that we put in t-shirt boxes and covered with sand. Each kid got a pair of Dollar tree safety goggles and a paint brush. The box lid came it with it, so it served as an archeological dig and a favor. We did that party by the pool and are doing a pool party again. August 5th in Oklahoma is hot!” —Jill
  • “Water! Those little ones love to play in water.” — Melissa
  • “Pajama party! Kids (and parents) came in the morning in their PJ’s. We had breakfast casserole, breakfast breads and fruit. Donuts stacked as a cake for birthday kiddies. Over in time for everyone to be tuckered out and back to bed ( in PJ’s of course) for nap time. Hands down parents favorite birthday. Kids had a great time too. Decorations included fun bedding, pillows, nighttime reading like goodnight moon…party favors were slippers! Teddy bears set out completed decor but would have been cute favors too. Cutest pics ever. I could go on and on…” —Heidi
  • “It’s pretty simple, but most kids love the ‘keep the balloon in the air’ game.” —Julie

Do you have any advice for an awesome second birthday party?

 

I thought I was excited about getting pregnant forever and a day ago. I thought I couldn’t have any excitement that could compare. Well, I tell you what… the week that both my best friend and my sister told me they were both pregnant… I found out I could get much, much more excited!

The really hard part about that excitement… I couldn’t tell ANYONE! If you know me, then you know this is extremely difficult. I like telling people what gifts I’ve gotten them before they’ve had a chance to open them. Christmas shopping has to happen the weeks before Christmas or I will just GIVE away the gifts as soon as I purchase them!

Thankfully, both my sister and BFF shared their “We’re Pregnant” announcements and gave me permission to post about it on my blog. I can breathe again! I had to share their announcements though because they are so stinking creative. I just posted an image of my pregnancy test for Facebook and created a free printable for the blog. My friend created an awesome photo collage and my sister created a video with the help of her hubby. Her hubby has mad skills, y’all.

Crazy Awesome Pregnancy Announcements

My best friend and her awesome hubby took these photos themselves and then put the collage together.
My best friend and her awesome hubby took these photos themselves and then put the collage together.

My sis and her husband’s video announcement. They have a thing for converse shoes (see their wedding.)

EEEEEE… I’m going to be an AUNT times two in January. 2014 is going to be AWESOME.

Did you announce your pregnancy in a special way? Or, are you planning to in the future?