Birthday Party Ideas

Welcome to my little brainstorming site for my kids' birthday parties! I'm currently in the process of figuring out what I want to do for 2012. I'm thinking of a camping or fire pit party for my almost 6 year old boy, but I'm still stumped on my almost 5 year old girl. Thankfully I still have a few months to figure out her theme! Basically, I search the web for lots of ideas, and post them here, linking back to the original site (gotta give credit to those brilliant minds that had the idea in the first place).

In case you missed last year's ramblings, here is the condensed version:

 I did a Lego party for my son that I absolutely LOVED!! It was seriously the most fun party I've planned, and the boys had a blast. If you want to see pictures from our Lego party, go here or here.  My favorite online finds from that party were the banner idea from Craftomaniac, the homemade table runner and balloon weights, and the place cards.  I made them all, but found the ideas online.

For my daughter's 4th birthday I did a Pinkalicious party, based on the book Pinkalicious.  It was so much fun, though a little more work.  Plus, girls are girls and they are a little harder to entertain and keep happy than the boys :)  To see pics from our party, go here!  The best site for ideas for this party was seven thirty three, by far.  She did a Pinkalicious party for her daughter and has lots of free printables and fun stuff to use.  Also, check Think Pinkalicious because they have lots of fun ideas as well. 

As promised, here goes some of my brainstorming for this year's camping party:

We'll start with Kelsey over at Daisy Dreaming - she did an awesome camping party for her son.  Here are just a few of my favorite things, but you should really check out her entire post!  What do I love the most?  Honestly, those signs are pretty stinking fun!  I also like the pom poms, and the colors that she chose, plus I know how to make the pom poms myself - score!  Oh, and those cupcakes are freaking awesome!  So creative - and I have those little candy rocks already, somewhere ;)

Next, check out Tracie's party at TSJ Photography!  I love her signs, her invites, the outdoor movie theater setting, the "Happy Camper Mix" - all of it!  And I love that she did a girly camping party since we have a little princess that will be turning 5 later this summer!

The gang at Haute Apple Pie did a great camping themed birthday party.  I especially love the bug juice and food labels!  And those cupcakes and "S'more for Later" bags might be the cutest things ever!

Lisa over at Moore Minutes did another fun camping party.  I especially love that banner!  Check out all of her fun ideas!

Melissa at Mason Bay made a great burlap table runner - I could totally do that, right?!  She gives a great tutorial and makes it look pretty gosh darn easy!

The Creative Homemaker has a great scavenger hunt bag:

The TomKat Studio featured one of their reader's parties - wow!  Loving her ideas, too :)

Check out these awesome gift bag ideas from KelleHampton.com :)

And just because I love these ideas, and I may or may not use them for this party, here are a few generic great birthday party ideas:

A Girl and a Boy and the string of balloons... I mean, who needs expensive paper lanterns when you can do this?!

Amy's daughter's orange birthday - love the wrapping paper as a table runner idea!

Spearmint Baby party - love the individual veggie cups and fruit kabobs - I've also seen individual 7 layer dips and other type things too!  Brilliant :)

4 Men 1 Lady and their brilliant outside salad serving idea

And last, but not least, a gorgeous balloon wreath from Our Best Bites

Whew - now it's June - the camping party is behind me and it was a blast!  To check out some of our pictures, go HERE.

Moving on to the next birthday party... PIRATE ROCKSTAR!  I'm still not quite sure where Kate got this idea from, but she's sticking with it, and has been since February.  Time to get my creative juices flowing.  I decided to stick more with the "pirate" aspect of the theme and throw in some pink and purple and sparkles to make it sort of girly and rockstar-ish.  So here are some fun ideas that I've found.  Thanks, Pinterest!

First up is this awesome pirate party over at Catch My Party.  I love the table decoration - simple black burlap with a pirate ship in the middle of the table, a treasure chest with "jewels" hanging out and gold coins scattered about.  She had everything classic red, black, and white to tie in.  Her other decorations were amazingly detailed too.  Activities consisted of cannon ball fighting, walk the plank, paint the pirate, dress like a pirate, decorate a sword, and dig for treasure.  Love it!  Go check out all of her pictures.

This one isn't from a set party, but from etsy.  I just love etsy :)  How cute are these?!

Here is a fun pirate party that was featured at Kara's Party Ideas.  I love the glass containers for pirate gold, the shark fruit salad and the pirate cookies!

A different pirate party at Kara's Party Ideas:

A cute banner from It's the Starks

I love these messages on a bottle at Amy Atlas!

3 fun ideas from Make & Takes

Lots of fun food ideas at Cake Pops Galore

This one might take the cake as my all time favorite - The Fickle Pickle.  I see myself returning to this site over and over again!  Love the decorations and the fun ideas!

I love the details of this party at Oh Amanda!  She had some great centers for them to go to - walk the plank, buried treasure, pegleg hop obstacle course, swab the deck, get your own pirate name, and a reading nook.

Lastly, this isn't really a "pirate" idea, but still a great idea that I found at Creative Party Buzz