A Birthday Under Construction

The birthday celebrations continued at our house this weekend. We decided to try having Brennan's friend party a week after his big day. With his birthday smack dab between Christmas and New Year's, this date has been much less rushed for us. We also kept the party a little smaller. I was determined to have a nice party, but not go overboard. Of course it did get a little more involved than I initially planned, but I still kept it reigned in I think.

The theme was Brennan's infatuation, construction equipment. He can name most big machines and especially loves backhoes. Lucky for him his Uncle Pick also loves construction equipment, that's his business. He parked a backhoe in our front yard.

I probably don't have to tell you that a lot of the decoration ideas came from Pinterest. I used Brennan's construction toys, printed road sign clipart for the table decorations, and added balloons. My favorite decoration was the road table covers. I topped yellow plastic covers with a runner of black plastic (just a black plastic cover folded) and used yellow Duck tape to mark the road.

The food was very simple. I made chocolate cupcakes with chocolate icing and crushed Oreo "dirt". There was ice cream, cheese puffs, and chips.

The favors were also pretty simple. For the younger guests (three and under) I made play dough to look like rocks. I placed the rocks in a plastic bag and topped each one with a small CAT construction machine. The older guests (5 to 11) happened to all be girls. I made each of them a personalized notepad, and added a couple of mechanical pencils and a fun eraser to their bags.

When the guests arrived, they each grabbed a personalized construction hat and headed downstairs to play. We served the food in what will be our bedroom in a few months, an actual construction zone. After gifts, they played some more. I think the birthday boy had a blast! He hasn't stopped yet!