Brooklyn’s Winter ONEderland Party (Plus My Frugal Party Planning Tips )

Well, you wouldn’t know it from Brooklyn’s expression, but I’d say her first birthday party was a success!

I’d been thinking about her party for several months, and I found so many cute party theme ideas on Pinterest (of course!). That’s where I found the idea for the “Winter ONEderland” theme, and I immediately knew that’s what I wanted to do. Such a cute idea for a winter birthday, even if it’s not original :) After researching ideas for decorations, food, cake, etc., I soon realized that this party could get expensive QUICK.

So, I made most of the decorations myself. The big “one” on the mantle was really easy to make: I just found an old cardboard box in the garage, cut a “one” out, and taped the pictures on to make a collage. I thought it turned out cute!

Putting pictures on the cardboard cut-out

All finished!

*As a bonus, it is now hanging on Brooklyn’s door, so we’re getting extra use out it. I loved it too much to throw it away right after the party :)

The banner on the mantle was really easy to make too! It is just Brooklyn’s monthly pictures (1-12) cut into 4 inch squares and backed by white cardstock and either pink or gray scrapbook paper. I taped them onto the mantle about a week before the party, and they stayed up all week!

I also bought snowflake stickers and added one to each connecting corner…

Speaking of snowflakes, to make the house feel more like a “winter wonderland”, I decided to make snowflakes and hang them throughout the kitchen and living room areas. This was a SUPER cheap project! All you need are coffee filters, a pair of scissors, tape, and some clear fishing line. It was hard to get good pictures of the snowflakes hanging, but I thought they really turned out well!

This was the night before the party…after I’d hung several of them in the kitchen

So Frugal Tip #1: DIY decorations! It may take more time than if you just bought a “party package” on Etsy or bought a bunch of stuff at Party City, but you can save a lot of money if you do the work yourself. Plus, it’s so neat to be able to say you made things yourself! I bought several things with coupons at Hobby Lobby or Michael’s, so if you start planning early enough, you can save a lot of money that way too.

Brooklyn’s party was at 2 PM, so I didn’t feel like we needed to have a ton of food. We ended up serving fresh fruit (pineapple, strawberries, and grapes), veggies (carrots and celery with ranch dressing), chips, and sugar cookies.

“Frosty’s Fresh Fruit” and “Reindeer Treats”

“Penguin Potato Chips” and “Snowflake Sugar Cookies”

The birthday girl tried pineapple for the first time and loved it!

Frugal Tip #2: Don’t have your party at a time when guests will expect a full meal! Then, you can get away with less food overall. Less food equals less money AND less stress. I didn’t have to worry about making a bunch of stuff the day before or day of the party, and it was great!

Frugal Tip #3: Get creative when using extra supplies that you might have. We ended up with a bunch of extra invitations because my first order didn’t show up by the date it was supposed to come. I called the company, and they sent me another set for free. Then, the first order of invites showed up the very next day! So, we had WAY too many invitations total. What was I going to do with them all? Well, I ended up folding them in half and using them as name cards for the food, drinks, and games. I thought it was a great way to use something that I would otherwise probably just end up throwing away. Plus, who doesn’t like to eat food with “cute” names? :)

We also had several different drink options: hot chocolate, punch, and water. I found a great recipe for crockpot hot chocolate on Pinterest. I doubled the recipe but only used one can of sweetened condensed milk, and it fit perfectly in my crockpot and tasted great!

I saw several ideas for doing a hot chocolate bar with different mix-ins and chocolate spoons, but I ended up just serving mini marshmallows to keep it simple.

For people who wanted a cool drink, they could choose between “Polar Punch” or “Melted Snowmen”!

The “polar punch” was just a big bottle of Blue Hawaiian Punch, a bottle of white grape juice, and a 2-Liter of 7-Up. The white “foam” floating on top is a few scoops of vanilla ice cream :) It was pretty tasty! The melted snowman labels were another Pinterest find :) I loved those!

Frugal Tip #4: Try to borrow items that you might need for the party but won’t use enough to justify buying one for yourself. My mom offered to let me use her beverage dispenser for the polar punch, and that worked out great. I didn’t have to worry about what to put it in or go out and buy something that I wouldn’t use much in the future.

As for the cake, I knew I didn’t want to spend a lot of money on a cake that would get destroyed in an instant. I loved so many ideas I found online, but I realistically knew I couldn’t recreate them at home. I’m not a professional cake decorator by any means! I did end up making Brooklyn’s smash cake, but I definitely kept it simple.

The cake table!

One helpful tip I found online was to use a small 16 oz Corningware bowl to bake two cake layers. Stack them on top of each other with a little icing in between, and you’ve got the perfect size smash cake!!

Brooklyn’s cake was apple-banana spice cake. I found the cake recipe online (of course!), and it turned out moist and very tasty. Brooklyn definitely approved! (More on that in a minute). The icing was cream cheese. Add a snowflake on top and a “one” cut out of cardstock and taped onto a toothpick, and you’ve got a cute little homemade smash cake!

I had enough leftover batter to make 15 cupcakes, which was the perfect number for 13 guests. I couldn’t believe how well that worked out!! The cupcakes also got cream cheese icing, and then some pink sprinkles for good measure. The “one” toppers came from Hobby Lobby :)

I also wanted to make a little “banner” to decorate Brooklyn’s high chair seat. It was very simple! I used the same pink and gray scrapbook paper, and the silver snowflakes came from Joann’s (on clearance for a dollar or two!).

As far as entertainment, we kept things pretty simple too. Brooklyn was the only kid at her party (since she doesn’t have any cousins and one-year-olds don’t really have “friends”!), so we didn’t need a lot of games or anything. I made a slideshow with a lot of her pictures from her first year of life, so we had that playing on repeat on our TV in the living room. Everyone liked seeing her pictures and reminiscing about different memories! I did make a “Brooklyn Trivia Quiz” just for fun. It was 15 questions (plus a bonus) to see how well everyone knew Miss B. I think everyone enjoyed it, and it was funny to see their reactions to some of the answers.

Rae Rae got the best score on the quiz…she only missed one question!

I also thought it would be fun to compare Brooklyn’s 12 month picture with one of me and one of Travis at her age. Everyone agreed that she’s looking a lot like me these days! :)

Brooklyn (left), Daddy (top right), Mommy (bottom right)

Okay, onto the actual party…it was a lot of fun! We kept it pretty small by only inviting grandparents, great-grandparents, aunts, and uncles. We wish we could have invited both of our extended families, but that quickly would have ballooned to about 100 people! So, 13 people was much more manageable. I also think Brooklyn would have been really overwhelmed and overstimulated by a huge crowd at her party, so it worked out better for her too.

Frugal Tip #5: Keep the guest list small if possible. It makes for a happier baby (in my opinion) and less stress on those who are planning the party!

Brooklyn was in a pretty good mood for the whole party. We tried to time it around her naps, and that was a smart move. I think she enjoyed seeing everyone!

The birthday girls! (Aunt Jenn’s birthday is 3 days after Brooklyn’s.)

One of the few pictures she smiled for…with Aunt Alisha!

Aunt Emily drove up from Tuscaloosa for Brooklyn’s party. So sweet!

Uncle Tyler and B–he wouldn’t let her chew on that pen, and she wasn’t happy about it. Ha!

Brooklyn crawled over into Uncle Chandler’s lap–his first time to hold her! (This was after her cake smash, so that’s why she’s in her PJs)

Brooklyn didn’t really care about opening presents, which wasn’t a surprise considering she didn’t care about Christmas presents a couple of months ago either :)

Since she got so many toys for Christmas, we specifically requested “NO TOYS” for her birthday. So, she got a lot of clothes instead! Doesn’t she look thrilled? :)

The best part was eating the tag…haha

Looking at one of her birthday cards with a fuzzy rabbit on the front :)

That was the best gift as far as B was concerned! Good job, Jenn and Chandler!

Frugal Tip #6: The best gifts for a one-year-old are usually simple and pretty cheap! Brooklyn liked the birthday cards, hangers, and tags on the clothes the best out of anything she got…haha. So, get creative, and don’t feel like you have to spend a lot of money on your gift!

After opening gifts, it was time for CAKE!!! Of course, this is what we were all excited about. Brooklyn hadn’t ever had cake (or dessert, for that matter) before, so I couldn’t wait to see how she liked it.

Matching bib and party hat from Hobby Lobby

In position and ready for cake!

“What is this thing???”

“I like this sweet stuff!”

At first, Brooklyn was just licking the icing off. It was like she didn’t know that the cake part was edible. Once, she figured that out though, she started shoving big handfuls of cake in her mouth. I’d say she likes cake! Or making messes. Actually, probably both :)

At some point, she took a break for some water. I’m sure she was thirsty!!

“I wonder if I can dump this cake off in the floor??”

Luckily, we caught her before she managed to do that! After she had pretty much demolished the cake, we took a few pictures with her…

Daddy and Mommy with the birthday girl!

Aunt Jenn and B (she wasn’t quite ready to give up the cake yet…hehe)

Gramps and Rae Rae

She loves them!!

Rae Rae and Cici

This is one of my favorites! So sweet!

And, here are the videos of all the fun in case you’re interested:

Once I was convinced that everything had been thoroughly documented (haha), it was time for cleanup. Cake was everywhere!! Let’s just say she headed straight to the bathtub from her high chair :)

Time for a bath!

By the time Brooklyn was finished with her bath, she was pretty tired! Can you blame her? :) She stayed up and “visited” for a little while longer, but by about 4 PM, it was time for a nap. After she went in the crib, everyone stuck around for just a little while longer, and then the party was over.

Overall, it was a great day! Obviously, first birthday parties are more for the parents (or the mom, honestly) than the child, so I tried not to go too overboard on party planning. Still, I wanted it to be cute and memorable, and something that Brooklyn can look back on in years to come. Hopefully, she’ll be able to tell from the pictures that we all had a great time! And I feel good about it too because I didn’t break the bank on the party. I don’t have an exact figure, but I think we definitely spent less than $75 total, and a lot of that was using Hobby Lobby gift cards.

So, Frugal Tip #7: Start planning the party early. USE COUPONS whenever possible! Buy stuff when it’s on sale. I spent about $10 on invitations from Zazzle because I bought them back in December when they were having an awesome sale. Print pictures out from Shutterfly or Walgreen’s using coupon codes. Use things around the house you already have for decorations. Get creative! Plus, if you start early, it’s so much less stressful, and you’ll be able to really enjoy the day with the birthday girl or boy!

Cute, fun birthday parties don’t have to be expensive! Actually, the only thing you REALLY need is a cute kid, right? Everything else is just little details :)