11407

Construction Party -1yr- Construction Bingo

June 2005

Wanda in Signal Hill, CA , USA

Special Mention

My idea for our son's first birthday party started when we decorated his nursery.  We planned on construction so I decided we would carry that theme through his first year.  I started purchasing construction theme things as soon as I saw them.  When my son was three months old, I found yellow construction worker hats for 3 for $1.00 and bought out the store.  I bought about 30 of those hard hats.  I also found construction zone party goods at the 99 cent store and stocked up on those as well.  My son's birthday was in September and at the end of the summer Target had all thier summer items on clearance and I was able to buy 5 huge dump trucks for nearly nothing.  They were originally 10.00 and I got them for 70% off! 

In August, I began the preparation:  Inviation a yellow constuction paper pop up card.  The front had two lanes. Underneath the lanes, the invitation read, "Every road leads" and inside it read "The Ulufanua construction site". Inside was a pop up picture of our little foreman sitting inside one of the dump trucks wearing a yellow hard hat.  The invite told everyone waht time thier shift started.  It also said that if they could not make thier shift to please contact the Site supervisors (us the parents)

Cake:  We had a dump truck made for the party.  This was no flat sheet, this was a three dimensional cake made locally, the back of the dump truck was filled with trash! ( chocolate cake crumbed up )  The cake was so amazing that everyone who saw it didn't realize it was the cake!  The dump trucks were filled with various things.  One was filled with dirt (oreo's and worms), another was filled with chips, etc.  When the children reported for thier shift they were photographed at a huge cardboard bulldozer, which we later used for our thank you cards. 

They were then sent to clock in for thier shifts.  I had an actual time clock and timecards that I put into my son's scrapbook showing all the crew that was at the Ulufanua Construction Site on his first birthday.  After clocking in they each received orange safety vests that I found at the 99cent store and they were given thier tool belts which I bought at Home Depot and had personalized for each child as they arrived.  After receiving thier toolbelt they were sent to the tool shed where they received thier tools.  I was able to find plastic hammers, saw, wrenches, screwdrivers, and various other tools at a local party store.  Once they were dressed properly and had all thier tools they received thier hard hats and then they were sent to thier work site.

We have a huge lot right behind our home and it was all roped off with construction tape ( the yellow and black kind that says caution) and we played games.  They were all construction related games.  For example we played a game where they had to run to the end of the lot and there they found a tool box that had overall, a dirty t-shirt, sock, workboots,an a hard hat.  They had to get dressed, run back to thier team undress and have that person dress run back to the end of the lot undress and so on and so on until everyone on their team had dressed.  Our pinata was a dumptruck and besides filling it with candy we also had mini constuction men and various paper cut outs of tools. 

For the adults we played construction bingo.  WE gave away prizes having to do with what else.  We have away, screwdriver sets, emergency car kits, tool boxes, home depot cards.  They loved being included in the festivities.  I used my husbands big tool boxes to hold all the party favors.  I decorated brown lunch bags with construction themes and filled with all the goodies they aren't normally allowed to eat. 

Decorations:  The tables were cover with construction themed fabric that I picked up through the months of planning and each had various construction vehicles as their center pieces.  The entire propety was covered with black and yellow ballons, ribbons and caution tape. The back of the house had a huge sign that Read: Ulufanua Construction site and I also put up signs outside the house and decorated the porch with the cutout construction bulldozer, ribbons and lots of ballons.  There was a sign in front of our house that read.  Jeremiah's construction party, hard hats needed.   

Food:  I didn't want to go with sandwiches (that was my first idea was like meals a construction worker would have in his lunchbox) but instead we had a taco bar complete with all the fixings (yellow rice, refried beans, salsa, chips, tamales, and the taco bar served 4 different types of taco!)  in addition for the kiddies, we had cotton candy machine, nachos, hotdogs and chili.  It was an awesome party!  Everyone had a great time and I received many many compliments.  I saved all the table cloths and am planning on making a comforter and curtains for his new 2 year old room.  I am also taking the big dump trucks and screwing them into his wall as a sort of shelf.

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