For Zagan’s second birthday we created a rainbow themed party.
Around this time, Zagan was learning about colours. We thought it was a great idea to throw a colourful party. We enjoy being outdoors, so decided to host the event at Mount Field National Park. It was a cold and rainy day. Thankfully, before we arrived another family had an early bbq breakfast by the fire, which made things a little warmer.
Invitations
I found joy making all of the invitations myself, using supplies from my stock. It was quite time consuming, because I was using a stencil and individually colouring every letter, though I had only four invitation packs to prepare. For each pack, I created an envelope, the invitation, a card for each child to ‘write’ their wishes for Zagan and finally a blank card and envelope for each child to colour in and present with their present. I added some cute stickers to help the kids’ designs become 3D. Because I had everything I needed, I was able to make all invitation packs without spending money.
Gifts / Party Favours
Similarly, so I could tailor them to each child, I made all of the gifts / party favours, as well as the gift bags. For the kids under one I made some ribbon rings. I used a small bamboo ring and wrapped about 10 ribbons of different colours, designs, textures and lengths. For the older kids (aged two to three) I created a colour book by cutting rectangles of similar colours, using an eyelet punch to bind each colour palette together, then using a hinged ring to add each ‘page’ of the book. To involve Zagan, and help the kids remember the day, Z created some artwork, which I wrote on and framed, as a fun way to say ‘thank you for coming to my party’. Finally, I included a cost-effective pre-purchased canvas painting pack as well as some fun little toys like a neon coloured bouncy ball, bubbles and toy cars. Fortunately, I had most of the supplies I needed. In the end, each pack cost me about AUD$10.
Food
Unfortunately I do not have any decent photos of the food, which is a shame because everything was so colourful. If I didn’t add food colouring, I presented things in colourful containers, wrapped things in rainbow wool, added those stick on bows or added labels with letters individually stencilled and coloured. We enjoyed a BBQ, various salads, burgers, a fruit platter, a cheese platter, jelly and cream cups, spring rolls, apple turnovers and of course cake. I made a red velvet cake, but forgot to remove the cocoa powder, which meant unfortunately the rainbow colours weren’t as bright as they should have been.
Games
We used two tables at the BBQ area – one for food, and the other for games and activities. Almost everything I brought on the day was from a paid subscription to KiwiCo (USA based company | no affiliation). We really enjoyed everything from here, the boxes are age and developmentally appropriate, colourful, excellent quality and interactive. Of course the kids didn’t really play with them, but at least they had the option.
Overall, whilst everything took a long time to make, I had a really great time creating everything for the kids. They seemed to have a fun time together making special memories.
If anyone is interested in having their invitations tailor made, I’d be happy to assist 🙂