Feb 8, 20203 min read

Alice's Birthday "Pawty"

Updated: Mar 4, 2020

Meaningful, fun and cute? Yes, you can have it all in the same party!

Our last party of 2019 was to celebrate Alice's second birthday and the children had a blast! Theme choice was based on the things she most likes, and it turns out she LOVES dogs. She doesn't discriminate, she just loves them all, specially our two fur babies: Popy and Gloria. So the theme was "The Dogs of My Life". ✔ MEANINGFUL

We planned some pretty fun activities for the kids to enjoy the party for a few hours. One of our choices was to rent a bounce house because kids love it. Alice would get out to eat something and go right back in. One of our friends added some extra fun by wearing a dog face and paws, and chasing her around. Kids enjoyed every bit of it (just as I did 😁)! ✔ FUN

Deciding what to gift as favors is somewhat tricky. We usually choose edible favors because we believe it's pointless gifting stuff that will just lay around and end up in the trash. So, instead of loading kids with favor bags filled with candies and plastic toys, we decided to have a plush puppy adoption station. That way, kids could get their favors and play the entire party. To make it even more exciting, they could name the puppies and craft their collars with colorful pipe cleaners. It was a hit!

✔ FUN

On a side note, we asked of those who wanted to bring gifts for Alice that instead they made a donation to the animal shelter where we used to volunteer. Alice has everything she needs and we love helping others (people and animals).

You can also donate HERE.

Last, but not least: coloring. It is such a fun activity! A real size cardboard dog house was the perfect fit. All the kids participated and had to do it together. Great to stimulate group activities, collaboration and friendship. ✔ FUN

To make it personal and cute, we asked her grandfather ("vovô" is how she calls him in Portuguese) to illustrate all the dogs that somehow are part of her life (all 15), and we made colorful cupcake toppers to match the colors of the decoration. We agree that "vovô" did a pretty good job considering he hasn't drawn anything over the last 10 years. ✔ MEANINGFUL & ✔ CUTE

A simple decoration, and small tables and chairs in the set-up made it not only cute, but functional for kids. Children just love it when they can see the food and choose what they want to eat and where to sit. That's why we like the Montessori approach and strongly encourage using it in parties. Make it simple by offering food they can grab, eat and go, without worrying about time being wasted. After all, the main purpose of the party is to have fun! Fruits were available to encourage healthier choices, although most of them chose the sweets (I did the same). ✔ CUTE

A colorful, functional and fun set-up guaranteed this party success. Alice and her friends loved how everything was at their reach! Even our dogs liked it. In fact, Popy liked it so much he posed for all the photos! How cute is that?!

Singing "happy birthday" and blowing those candles was also very exciting and fun for Alice, specially because it was at her reach. It was a very special day!