Elmo Themed First Birthday Party: DIY-Style

Hey guys! So last weekend was my little baby boy’s first birthday party! His actual birthday is Thursday the 11th, so I will save the cheese until then 😉 Anyway, I wanted to share some of the DIY projects and other cuteness just in case you wanted to throw an Elmo-themed birthday party in the future.

So, without further ado…

FOOD:

Elmo Veggie tray:

Cherry tomatoes, carrots for nose, olives for mouth, ranch dip for eyes (with an olive pupil)

Elmo Fruit Tray:

Strawberries, mandarin orange nose, blueberry mouth, vanilla yogurt dip for eyes (with blueberry pupil)

Elmo Oreos for the chocolate lovers:

I had leftover Elmo icing pieces (from Party City) so I glued them to oreos with icing. Easy peasy and cute!

Elmo cupcakes:

Red icing with “furry” tip, marshmallow eyes (I cut in half), reeces pieces pupil glued on with icing, orange gum ball nose, black icing mouth

Cupcake Tower (Party City again)

Red Candy Bar

Twizzlers, Tootsie Pops, Swedish Fish, Gummy Bears, Candy swirl sticks, Hot Tamales, Peanut Chews, Kit Kats, M&Ms

Zachary’s “smash cake”

Yea, so I’m kind of a nut, and didn’t want to give him red dye, so I tried to dye the buttercream frosting I made (to top a natural vanilla cake I made) with pomegranate juice. The result was a pink Elmo. Eh, whatever 😉

For the “real food” I made a beef/bean chili, pulled pork sandwiches, and we had red chips (Doritos, BBQ chips) and veggie sandwiches. My mom made cole slaw too. YUM!

DECORATIONS

Elmo Lanterns: huge google eyes, orange pom pom, black construction paper, red lanterns (all from Party City)

Elmo Cups: red plastic cups, googly eyes, orange pom pom, black sharpie mouths

Zachary Name Banner: Story behind this is I knew I wanted one to go over the fireplace. I looked online to buy one (ex: Etsy) but they were insanely expensive, like $35! So I decided to make one. I bought (from Party City) vinyl letters, scrapbook paper and red card stock (all on sale) and got to work. It was much harder than it looked as I was anal retentive about the symmetry.