Next year I’ll be 40 years old and I can’t wait to plan something fun and fabulous to celebrate such an emblematic milestone. But while I wait, since my husband is one year older than me, that means I can have a trial run. I’ll follow my essential guide to a toddler’s birthday party to plan this get together and make it as fun as kids’ parties usually are. Let’s do this!
Inspiration
Besides the theme being that he’ll be 40 years old, I want to try to incorporate some of his preferences and personality into the party. In his case: he loves grilling, hot sauce and home improvement, he prefers beer or bourbon for drinks and he is addicted to jelly beans. He also has a great sense of humor. Let’s see what we can do with all that.
Planning
WHO: we are still in the middle of a pandemic, but we are both fully vaccinated and all our friends nearby are too. Plus, his birthday is in July, so the warmer weather allows for an outdoors celebration. That means we might have around 10 – 12 adults and 4 kids.
WHEN: I wasn’t sure if I was going to host a barbecue (since he loves to grill) or an afternoon snack type of party (more practical and he wouldn’t need to work as much). Since we have a toddler who recently started fighting her midday nap, we might want to avoid excitement before her nap time. So afternoon snack is the best way to go!
WHERE: we have a nice backyard and deck so it should be comfortable for everyone.
WHAT: we’ll serve appetizers (finger food), beverages and a cake with party sweets for afterwards. Since it’s still 2 months away, I’ll wait to decide the full menu closer to the date. But I’ll be sure to come back and update this post afterwards. 😉
Preparing
Based on my inspiration research, here’s what I’m planning on executing for decorations:
For a backdrop, I’m going to try to make a balloon arch like this one. It’s simple yet cheerful and fun. I haven’t found a kit exactly like this yet but it seems doable without one. Wish me luck!
Since he loves hot sauce, I thought this one above could be a fun and easy to execute idea for party favors.
As a general decor idea, I really liked these beer bottles with flowers below. Cheap, easy to make and it matches the theme. I just need to remember to save a few beer bottles in the next couple of months for that.
Who’d think I was going to find such a genius idea like these jelly bean filled beer mugs? As a lover of beer and jelly beans, he is going to freak out with this edible decor. And it’s definitely a big plus that using flowers and candy for decor, I’ll be producing less waste.
For the cake, I found this amazing idea that might be too hard to actually get (but I’m a dreamer). So I’ll probably just order a tasty simple cake and put this cheerful topper from Amazon on it.
For tableware, since it’s just 10 adults and 4 young kids, I won’t use any disposables. I’m going to take another one of Day’s advice on conscious consuming and use sturdy and reusable plastic tableware. But if I was going to go for disposables, I’d probably get a simple yellow kit at Party City to match the beer theme.
For entertainment, because of the kids we can’t have as many drinking party games as I’d like, so we’ll need to look for alternative ways of guaranteeing some embarrassment and laughs. But realistically, we’ll need games that kids can get involved in too because when you have toddlers, they take control of your every move. Here’s what I found:
And last but not least, I created a playlist on Spotify to set the mood back to our teenage years. It’s gonna be fun! 🙂
You can see these and other ideas in our 40th birthday Pinterest board. And I’ll make sure to write a blog post with the pictures of the actual party. See you!