For my daughters 3rd birthday we decided to have a backyard carnival. I bought invitations on ebay that were printed with a carnival scene. I used stamps.com to print stamps with my daughters photo on it for the invites and the thank yous. I started planning months in advance and buying all types of prizes at the $ stores, oriental trading and $1 spot at Target. For decoartions I begin painting large cardboard boxes. One was a huge box of popcorn (red & white striped) then I stapled yellow and white balloons to the top of it to look like popcorn coming out of the box. Next I painted a huge clown holding balloons, I cut a hole out for his face so the kids could put their face in for a photo and later to be used for the thank you cards. I also painted a huge sign that said Foster Fairgorunds est 2005 with a carnival scene on the bottom. I also painted a carousel horse. I used a projector for all the above projects it was so easy. My parents helped me make the "booths" for the games out of PVC pipe my mom sewed huge pillow type cases that slid over the frame in bright colors, polka dots and striped. It was all very festive. I used primary colors for everything. I printed out a ton of signs with printshop one for each game, concession stand banner and menus, Ticket booth signs etc. I also used pritnshop to make admission tickets with my daughters photo on them as well as birthday bucks that the kids could use to buy somehting at the concession stand. They looked like dollar bills but with her face...too cute! I made each child a ticket necklace with tickets to play all the games, and a large primary colored cloth bag with their initals on them (we used iron on letters in a polka dot fabric). Ballooons were everywhere, and we borrowed 2 tents to put up in the yard. One was for the concession stand that had a popcorn machine, cotton candy machine, snow cone machine, animal crackers, giant swirl suckers, drinks etc. I bought a circus marches cd off of amazon that played in the background between that and the popcorm smell it was pretty festive! I used a lemonade stand found at big lots for the ticket booth. For the games we had 1)shuffleboard slide- used little tykes game and drew the shuffleboard on the driveay with chalk. 2)Wild west shootout - game I bought at kb toys that uses a safe gun to "shoot" cans off a log this was so cute!!3)Soccer Kickoff- gorw to pro soccer goal and ball 4)Spray away- family fun website game you spray ping pong balls off of golf pegs with water guns. 5)Rollerball - a skee ball type game that we bought by arcade alley. 6) Bowling - plastic bowling set 7) duck pond - ducks in my daughters old blow up bath tub 8) lollipop tree. Each game had a laundry basket filled with prizes for them to choose from everyone was a winner. I had a table with sand art set up in the garage and a tattoo booth  A stiltwalker came she started the day by painting evryones faces, arms etc. then she put on her silts and juggled. Afterwards everyone got a balloon animal or hat. We had a moonwalk in the frontyard that had carousel horses on it. The birthday cake was a festive 3 layer cake with a white chocolate carousel on the top of it, it was beautiful! I had take home bags for each of the kids that had bubbles, m&m's, and kitkats all with personalized wrappers that said thanks for coming to my carnival party. This party was alot of work but it was also so much fun!! I am having party planning withdrawls now! This website was a huge help to me so I hope I can help someone too.