16967

Colors/Shapes -1yr- Music Like Yellow Submarine

November 2007

Lori in North Augusta, SC USA

Honorable Mention

We wanted a simple yet fun theme for my daughter's 1st birthday. Since she wasn't  into characters, I looked around at all her favorite things (toys) and it seemed so simple...Colors & Shapes.  After all, this is what she's been playing with and learning about since birth. With a few ideas in my head & a quick trip to the craft store the party theme started coming together. 

I created the invitations using different color stock cards, envelopes, and paper (As with the whole theme, I stayed with traditional rainbow colors: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, & purple).  I printed and cut out small red hearts (with the word RED in it), yellow rectangles (with the word YELLOW in it), and blue triangles (with the word BLUE in it), a large circle with the words around the edges. So the front read...Red, Yellow,& Blue  We're Having a Party and Want to Celebrate with YOU! With Child's Name's 1st Birthday in the center of the circle. Inside was a colored star (different colors were sent to each family) with the party info. At the bottom was a note saying...Your family has received the ---- (color) star. Wear this color & your 'team' will go far! It wasn't long before we started getting calls about the cute invites and everyone was excited about getting their 'team' shaped up for the big event.  

So it was time for decorations to pull this theme together. I purchased several different colored tablecloths, yellow food plates, purple cake plates, green cups, orange napkins, and blue cutlery.  I also purchased multi-colored lollipops and attached small shapes in different colors with each child's name on them.  They were put on the plates to mark their seat.   I picked up red party hats with different colored dots on them. I wanted my daughters to be special so I glued bright colored pom-pom balls around the rim with one on top and cut out the number 1 in yellow cardstock that I pasted on the front. Horary for computers and card stock!

For the banner, I printed each letter of HAPPY BIRTHDAY along with a few shapes on different color paper, cut them out, and pasted them to yet different colors of paper.  I wanted to make a big deal about her big YEAR.  I printed and cut out eight different shapes in different colors and posted them to different color paper with the words Smile, Bath, Teeth, Crawl, Stand, Sit, Eat, Walk at the bottom.  On top of the shapes I posted pictures of all my daughters firsts.  In the center I printed a poem about her 1st birthday and all her accomplishments. 

We even burned a really cheesy CD to play outside (we rented a cabin at the local state park so people were inside and out) with Color and Shape songs like Hip to be Square, Yellow Submarine, Blue Suede Shoes, You Spin me Right Round, Purple Rain..well you get the idea. 

Other decorations around were multi-colored balloon clusters, Happy 1st Birthday signs, and all of our guests in their team color hehe.  Once at the party everyone was round up to start the fun!

We had a buffet with round hamburgers and buns, yellow square cheese, green oval pickles, round white onions, round red tomatoes, multi-colored tortilla chips and salsa, rainbow goldfish crackers, rainbow colored vanilla wafers, and Fruity Pebble treats cut into different shapes. 

The main cake was two tier.  The bottom was a blue square and top a red circle with the number 1 piped in yellow on top with small different color shapes all over.  The smash cake was a small yellow circle with different color shapes all over. 

Now that everyone was full it was time for games!  Each team had one guess at how many gumballs were in a glass container (multi-colored gumballs of course).  We started to use colored popcorn but I didn't have enough patience to count it out with a little one running around my feet.  Reguardless, each family had fun coming up with a guess together.  Since we had older children  we had a digital camera Scavenger Hunt for the kids.  Each child was accompanied by an adult to find (outside of the party) 6 different colors, 6 different shapes, & then we hid a bonus item (a blue kickball with different colored dots).  With only 5 mins. They were off.  What they didn't know is that each item was worth different points.  It was all around fun for everyone! 

Now it was time to give out the goody bags and say goodbye.  All the goody bags were a different color with a shape pasted on the front with the child's name printed on it.  The older kids got multi-colored glow sticks, shape mind teasers, multi-colored bouncy balls, shape stickers, and candy.  The younger kids got mini coloring books and crayons, big punch balloons, books about colors & shapes, take-n-toss sippy cups, and rainbow chocolate chip cookies.  I wish I could describe all the decorations better but I guess you'd just need to see the pics. 

This is a fun and simple theme….Colors & Shapes are EVERYWHERE!

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