This year was going to be my youngest daughter’s first big birthday party with lots of friends there to celebrate her. As the date approached I found myself procrastinating like crazy in hopes that I could make this a reality and I was clueless as to how to make her birthday special without the party. One day inspiration struck and I’m going to share with you not only how we celebrated but also why I feel like it was so successful. The lesson I continually need to learn is to not expect so much of myself, especially as a parent. Some of the things we did may not work for your family but, I hope you find inspiration in them.
One day I was scanning through social media and a picture grabbed my attention. Sign Dreamers. This awesome company will rent you a personalized sign for your front yard. The sign can be as big or as small as you want and have as many extra visuals as you choose. The night before someone came to set it all up and after 24 hours came to take it down. I didn’t have to do a thing and my daughter ADORED it. Not only that we had multiple neighbors wishing her happy birthday. It made her feel so special! The icing on it all was that I got to support a local company.
That started the ball rolling and I found a local company that delivered balloons right to our front door. Once Upon A Balloon asked for my daughter’s preferences and magically a huge arrangement of birthday balloons showed up at a prescheduled time.
For her birthday cake, my daughter wanted me to make her a wonder woman cake. I happen to be fighting tennis elbow, so rolling out fondant is not on my list of abilities at the moment. Funny story, I don’t play tennis, but you can get tennis elbow from pushing a jogging stroller. Anyway, I decided to embrace a local company again. Confectionairess is a local Zionsville bakery that does pre-orders, but they also make cupcakes and cakes daily. I made a big deal about how she was going to get to pick out her very own birthday cupcakes or cake and she owned it. Immediately she knew exactly what she wanted and it was a cool opportunity for my newly minted 4-year-old to feel empowered to make her own choice. They were delicious by the way.
We then attended a local event to uplift the importance of black lives, Chalk for Change. My kiddos got to listen to a friend, James Payne, speak about the importance of not being color blind. That was followed by the chance for my girls to write out positive messages for the community alongside many other community members. To top it all off Kona Ice was there. It was a great way to celebrate my daughter’s heritage and involve them in a local social distance event.
We ended the day “camping” in our basement. My girls get their sleeping bags, pick a movie, and get to stay up late while falling asleep next to each other. This is always one of their favorite special activities and something we keep in reserve as a treat.
This ended up being one of my favorite birthdays ever for so many reasons:
- It was spread out over an entire day.
- There were little moments where my daughter was reminded it was her birthday and how special she is.
- We got to support multiple local businesses.
- It was so easy.
- It was so NOT stressful.
- I had no cleanup afterward like you always do with birthday parties.
- My kiddo didn’t receive a ton of birthday gifts that she doesn’t she need.