Construction Themed 4th Birthday Party

This past weekend was my son's 4th birthday party.  We alternate each year on which child gets the big party and this year was his turn.  I'm all about doing up cute parties, but within reason.  They still have to fit into our one income budget.  Thankfully, I had a few Etsy sales beforehand so I had a little bit extra to spend.

Months ago I asked him what kind of cake he wanted for his birthday and he and I perused Pinterest for ideas and when he saw this one from Fredillicious that was it, that was the one he wanted!  He had that exact same backhoe already so this was "his" cake!

(source)

So that's how we came up with our construction theme. 

We found this cute set of plates at Hobby Lobby and that's what I based everything around.

Instead of sending out paper invitations, I designed this one on the Red Stamp app using a picture of the napkins from our party supplies, and texted digital invites instead.  They're free to design and free to send, that = cheap!  

I kept the decor fairly simple, but still fun.

Our buffet was set up to be the gift area.  I got mylar balloons from the dollar store instead of latex balloons because they hold their air so much better and they're the same price as getting latex ones filled at the grocery store.  It saved me from having to run back to town the morning of the party to get balloons filled.  I bought them the day before and they were still just fine.  The same would not have been true of latex balloons.  I was very thankful for my moment of genius when I thought of this.  :D

In the windows on either side of the buffet I placed a couple of his construction toys that he already had.  Cheap decor!  

On another wall I made this little photo op area using a dollar store tablecloth and streamers, cutouts from the Hobby Lobby set, and caution tape I found on Amazon.  

(link will be at the end of the post)

On the dining room table I set out little hard hats for each of the kids.  They were pretty flimsy, but the kids didn't seem to care.  We also found the little traffic cones at Hobby Lobby.  I used a black plastic tablecloth folded up as a runner down the middle and just put a strip of the caution tape in the middle of that to mimic a road.

The centerpiece was his beloved cake that he had talked about for months!  :)

It was a bit of a comedy of errors to get it to this point, but he and I were both happy with how it turned out in the end.

He already had all the little toys and they made the perfect cake toppers.  I found the traffic cone candles on Amazon.

He spotted the candy rocks while we were at Hobby Lobby and he was SO excited when I told him they would be perfect for his cake!  They were good too, tasted like M&M's.

I set up the bar as the food area and put this cute little banner on the front (also from Hobby Lobby).  Again, I kept it really simple.  I had seen a lot of cute ideas for themed food for this type of party, but I decided against the extra stress and the extra cost that would involve.  Hubby grilled hot dogs, I made baked mac-n-cheese, and we had chips to go with it.  It was perfect and stress free.

I found the cute little orange caddy at Winn-Dixie for $1.50 and it was just perfect to hold the utensils.

For the goody bags I bought these little orange bags at Dollar Tree, 3 for $1, and I used a paint marker to draw the construction lines and "thank you" on them.  It was done rather hastily at sort of the last minute and they certainly were far from perfect, BUT...they were cute enough and they worked.  

They each had a can of silly string, a few pieces of candy, and a rubber eraser shaped like a dump truck (Hobby Lobby).  Nothing too overboard.

The drink table sported a couple more of his toys that he already had.  

I only planned one game and I'm glad I did it that way.  They had so much fun just playing in our kids' rooms with all of their toys and it gave me a chance to sit and chat with the other adults instead of running around trying to coordinate everything.

The one game came from an idea I saw, on Pinterest of course, lol!  It worked out perfectly because we already had a large floor puzzle that was construction themed.  We kicked the kids outside for a little bit (Hubby ended up piling them all into the Kawasaki Mule and taking them for a fun ride) while we adults hid all 60 pieces of the puzzle around the house.  When they came back they had such a blast hunting for the pieces and then working together to complete the puzzle.

Even the oldest boy there, who originally claimed he wasn't playing any games, got in on it and had  way more fun than he would probably admit to, lol!

The nearest I can figure I spent approx. $85 on decor, and about $15 on food.  So for around $100 I was able to give him a fun little construction themed party that was cute and festive, but not overboard, incredibly expensive, or stressful.  

That's my kind of party!

If you'd like to see more of my small budget parties you can visit these links:

1st Birthday Cupcake Party

2nd Birthday Barnyard Party

2nd Birthday Frog Party

3rd Birthday Pool Party

4th Birthday Pinkalicious Party

Vintage Inspired Ice Cream Social

Winter Snowman Party

   

                                                 

(Affiliate Links)