5 Tips for Throwing Kid Parties on a Budget

We had a little friend birthday party for Olive this week and it was so much fun!

I asked her input in the planning and tried to do just what she wanted - play with her friends.  That seemed easy enough.

This is the first year she's asked to have a friend party.

Five seemed like a good age to start that.  When do your kids start having friend parties??

We invited some of her best buddies, picked a date and hoped the weather would cooperate for a backyard birthday party.

Tips for Throwing a Kid Birthday Party on a Budget:

1. Have the party at your house
Depending on the time of year your child's birthday falls, it can be a big savings to have the party at your house.  It's a bonus if the weather is nice and the party can be held outside.  Outside parties are much less stressful if you're worried about messes.  They are a little stressful if you're worrying about the weather.  You could always come up with an alternate rain our location. 

2. Plan the party in between meal times
Mid morning, afternoon or after dinner are fun times to gather friends.  You can offer plenty of snacks and avoid the cost of providing a meal for kids and their parents.  

3. Use What You Have
Since we had our party at home we pulled out all of our kid toys, bikes, balls, trucks, sidewalk chalk and more for the kids to play with.  I only bought a couple of things (Glove a Bubbles and a game) that we can continue to use long after her party.

4. DIY decorations, games and favors
Make your own chalkboard signs, banners, tags, banners, etc. to save yourself money.  I cut flowers from our yard for floral arrangements and used our potted plants as decorations on our deck.

5. Reuse decorations
Pick the same thing for your family party as your friend party so you can reuse decorations.  We picked out unicorn decorations and used them for every birthday gathering.

Can you think of any other money saving tips for me??

I planned a menu of Olive's favorite foods - strawberries, brownies, powdered donuts, popcorn, apple straws, Nerds, Lucky Charms, Chex mix and lemonade.

We set out all of our toys for the kids to play with.

I used the flowers that are already potted on our deck for decorations.  Just added in a few unicorns to make things festive.  

 We played games (Unicorn Ring Toss) with toys we already have.

I did a nail painting station for glitter nails.  It didn't cost me anything and the girls loved it.  I just picked out three glittery nail polishes from my stash.  Each girl got to pick her nail color.  It was super quick and super fun.

We played Hot Potato.  Olive got this game for her birthday and we played it out our family party with her cousins and again with her friends.

We opened gifts!

Another fun, inexpensive game.  Give each kid a marker and a paper plate.  Put the plate up on their head and give them step by step instructions to draw something.  The winner is the person whose picture looks the closes to what it was supposed to be - A unicorn with a rainbow.  We had the kids draw 1 head, 1 horn, two eyes, two ears, one mouth, a mane and a rainbow.  It was really funny to see their finished art work.  Most wanted a moment to fix their drawings :)

Fletcher was outnumbered, but didn't mind.  He ended up snacking through almost the entire party.

Thankful for Olive's friends.

Glove a Bubbles - I bought a box of 10 at Sams.  They were so much fun.  We dumped the bubble solution into a bowl and the kids had a blast.  I love that it was a fun party game that we now own to use again and again.

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Hope you have a great weekend!!  We're supposed to get a lot of rain so we'll just have to wait and see what fun plans we can come up with for our family.

Linking up with My Glittery Heart

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