1. Venue
Bryce is obsessed with firetrucks, so this years theme wasn't hard to decide on. I called the Fire Captain and found out that you can't have birthday parties at the station but you can schedule a tour. I even got to pick my date, time, and which station I wanted! Even better? Its free! There is private neighborhood playground with a pavilion directly next to the station I wanted, so it was a double win! We don't have membership in that neighborhood, but my in-laws do, so it was easy to get.
2. Invitations
Last year I made them by hand. Yes by hand. Spent several hours designing them on the computer, printing, cutting and mounting. I've got toddler now, so Etsy was my best friend. I easily found a design I loved and a price I loved even better! $12 for a digital copy that I could print and mass produce as I please. A friend of mine actually printed them professionally for me, however you can print them at Walgreens on photo paper for next to nothing.
3. Decorations
I made most of the decorations myself. I really love making stuff so it didn't bother me one bit!
I made a simple banner out of scrapbook paper and stickers and hung it up with string and tape. I bought all of it at Hobby Lobby for 50% off. I just cut a triangle out about the size I wanted. I traced that triangle on all the paper and cut them out. Then I made more triangles in the secondary color but just made the top length 1 inch shorter so that they ended up 1/2 inch from the edge of the bigger triangle all the way around. I mounted them together with scotch tape. Then I added the red glitter stickers. I taped them on some thread and then hung them up on the fence with some tape. It was incredibly easy! from start to finish it prob took less than hour to make.
I recycled some tissue paper pom poms that I made for my brother's 21st birthday and hung them up in the pavillion and added some table cloths to cover the the graffitied tables. It just spiffed things up a touch. I actually still had the roll of red plastic table cloths left over from last years party! Good investment!
For the gift table, I bought a table runner from Oriental Trading online. It didn't really need a table runner, but it matched and I thought it was cute and it was like 3 dollars.
4. Party Favors
I bought the red gift bags and most of its contents from from Oriental Trading. There is stuff is so cheap you can't go wrong. Well maybe you can. On the website the firemen rubber ducks that I purchased, looked so cute! When they came they looked like a 2 year had hand painted them. I was going to return them, but I realized they were so cheap it wasn't worth my time and the hassle than to return them so I passed them out anyways. I bought some other cheap crap at Party City to put in there too. I put some orange tissue paper in the tops so it would look like flames. I wanted to dress up the bags with fire badges with the kids names on them, but I was trying to be as simple as possible.
5. Food
Now the food is where you can really blow your budget! I picked fire themed food that was also kid friendly. I even tried to pic something diet friendly!
yellow and fireman napkins - Oriental Trading
plates- Kroger
yellow dishes- Goodwill (my new love affair)
red chip bowl- my mommas house
tiered food server- Target (it is white- I taped yellow ribbon to it)
I made the labels for the food myself. I'm in love with the chalkboard cut outs that I found at Hobby Lobby! Seriously guys, the package had a bunch (sorry I can't remember how many maybe 20?) for like $3. They are perfect for parties and weddings! The best part is you can mount them on anything you want (in this case left over scrapbook paper from the banner). I bet you could use a wet paper towel to erase them and keep re-using them too!
The fireman poles were a huge hit!!! Kids and adults loved them! They were so easy to make! If you are willing to fork over some extra money you can buy pre-cut fruit at Kroger and then most of the work is done for you. I bought things that I could easily just pop on there. They only thing I had to cut was the strawberries. I bought the skewers in the pots and pans section at Kroger.
yellow snack cups- Hobby Lobby
If you wanted to dress up the water bottles you can add some festive ribbon on personalized labels.
Ok so Target has those dollar bins in the front of the store. Here recently they have been carrying a brand called Paper and Dots which I am absolutely obsessed with! That jar was $1! I bought a bunch of them to use around the house! I just added some ribbon that I had left over from my brother's party. The paper straws came from Oriental Trading. They had the cheapest deal on paper straws. I was going for a Dalmatian spot look. The punch in the background is one giant thing of Hawaiian punch mixed with 2 liters sprite. Several people loved it and asked what concoction it was. It is my go-to party punch.
6. The party!
The firemen were so awesome! They showed us around the fire station and then to garage to check out the trucks. They made it interesting for the adults too! We had so much fun! My Aunts, Uncles, Cousins, Cousin's kids, friends, kids from school, coworkers, grandparents, family friends, all came out to celebrate!
