For my son, Jalen's, 1st birthday party, I chose the Sesame Beginnings theme (Elmo, Cookie and Big Bird in diapers). He is in love with anything Sesame Street (SS), Elmo in particular, so it
was only appropriate. I created my own invitations on my computer and had them printed in color on cardstock at a print center. The cover was Baby Elmo, Cookie and Big Bird, scanned from the
party ware, announcing that my son, Jalen, was turning one. The inside left page was a picture of my son with Elmo that I had taken at Sesame Place. The right side had a cute poem with the
details of the party and on the back it said "this party is brought to you by the letter J and the number 1" with the SS sign logo. I got so many compliments on the invitations. I
started preparing for the party by making a scrapbook with all my son's photos from birth with a SS theme. I then made poster size Elmo, Big Bird, Cookie, Ernie, Grover, and Oscar. I had
pages of a coloring book enlarged and traced them with a craft knife on the poster boards. I used pom poms, felt and yarn hair for the noses, mouths, eyes, hair etc. They turned out great. I
placed them around the house for the party. Grover was in Grover's Super playroom with all of my son's SS toys: SS puzzles, plush toys, books, any SS toy my son had. Oscar was on top of
a garbage can, which we later used to play Oscar's Trash Throw. Ernie stood in front of a baby size pool that was filled with bubbles and rubber ducks, which was where the babies played
Ernie's duck pond. I also had the SS sign enlarged to legal size and hung it on the front door. There were balloons everywhere: 6 Sesame Beginnings mylars and 40 latex balloons. The Sesame
Beginnings streamers, danglers, banners, etc were hung up around the centerpiece, which was the cake. I ordered a specialty cake and had edible photos ordered of Baby Elmo, Cookie, and Big
Bird and the words "Happy 1st Birthday Jalen" in the same font used on the invitations. The morning of I placed the photos on the cake myself. It was so unique. I ordered SS
cupcakes for all of the children under age 2 and had SS cookies ordered for those who did not want cake. We had SS music playing during most of the party especially during all the games. We
played Oscar's trash throw, Ernie's duck pond, Pin the nose on Elmo, Elmo pinata, SS bingo, SS 123 number jumble and Elmo's color match and memory game, some I made myself and some I just
bought. I purchased a fishbowl-looking glass jar and filled it with goldfish crackers and had the guests guess the count of goldfish. I purchased SS beach balls, SS arm floaties, and SS swim
rings as prizes for the winners of the games. I purchased a long SS birthday card and had all the guests sign it for my son's scrapbook. We rented an Elmo costume and my husband dressed up
and surprised all of the children during one of the games. It was much cheaper than hiring someone. For the gift bags, I went all out. I purchased SS laminated meal place mats, SS coloring
books, SS activity books, SS pacifier holders, SS bibs, SS teethers, SS hangers, SS bottles from dollar stores. My husband gets discounted DVDs, so I purchased 15 SS DVDs. I also purchased
Elmo balls, SS sunglasses, SS whistles, Elmo notepads and SS cups from a party store. I placed the favors age appropriately in large red gift bags with gift tags. The gift tags were the
children's names printed on cardstock with the first letter of their name being the alphabet pictures from the Sesame workshop website.
For the adult favors, I purchased Elmo treat bags and filled them with heresy kisses and attached a thank you poem on red cardstock with my son's name and the party date. The party turned out to be such a success. Everyone had a great time. I cannot wait to plan his 2nd birthday.
