17个预算友好型儿童生日派对创意

想在不破坏银行的情况下给你的孩子举办一个令人敬畏的庆祝活动吗？我们掩护你！以下是我们在下一次孩子生日聚会上坚持预算的最佳建议。

Kids' Birthday Party Logistics

时机就是一切。《反对一切粒化：庆祝活动》一书的作者丹妮尔沃克说，把你的聚会安排在下午2点到5点。午饭后和晚饭前是聚会的最佳时间，这时客人不会期望饱餐一顿。

和朋友分享聚会。如果你孩子的生日和朋友的生日很接近，那就考虑双份派对。你和另一个孩子的父母将分担费用和责任。确保每个孩子都有自己的蛋糕和礼物！

RELATED:为你的孩子的生日聚会做的事情选择完全不为年幼的孩子。《简单的事情》一书的作者艾琳博伊尔建议，当孩子还小的时候，可以考虑完全不参加传统的生日聚会。"我和丈夫用野餐来庆祝女儿的一岁生日。"

给孩子们的生日聚会场地定价。不准备在你家招待客人吗？让一个场地来做这项工作可能更具成本效益和时间效益。来看看我们顶级的儿童生日派对场所。

生日派对上供应纸杯蛋糕的女人

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Supplies and Favors

Hunt for on-sale supplies all year. Start supply-hunting early; it’ll give you time to comparison shop. Plus, you’ll save yourself from running out at the last minute to buy overpriced things you’ve forgotten. “I’m on the lookout all year for party items that go on sale, usually in the dollar bin at Target, Dollar Tree, or the 99-cent store,” says Helen Holden, author of the blog Counting Candles.

Go digital for kids' birthday party invitations. In a Parents survey of nearly 1,500 parents, 73 percent of you said you sent paper invitations for your kid’s last birthday party. Next time, send your guests a free electronic one; you’ll save what you’d normally spend on paper invites.

Avoid party-store traps. Don’t pay a markup for party-store items that you could find elsewhere for less. For example, chocolates may be sold five for $1 (20 cents each) at party shops, but a bag of minis from a big-box store can be half as much.

• RELATED: The Best Birthday Party Food Ideas

Dress up humble supplies. Use what you have on hand to make plain party supplies feel special, as they typically cost half as much as decorated supplies. For example, use a hole-puncher to jazz up paper plates and napkins (punch holes around the outer edge of each plate and one corner of each napkin to create a design). You can also rely on binder- and dot-stickers to decorate plain balloons. Buy a few key items to establish the theme, like a special foil balloon, and stick to affordable basics for everything else.

Order supplies online. Prices aren’t always better if you shop online, but hitting the web for your favors and decorations may help you avoid impulse purchases. Here are a few of our favorite sites for discount kids' birthday party supplies:

• amazon.com
• birthdayexpress.com
• bulktoystore.com
• dollartree.com
• papermart.com
• partypalooza.com
• save-on-crafts.com

Upcycle old kids' birthday party favors. Hate goody bags? Jodi Levine, of SuperMakeIt.com, suggests embracing the stuff kids bring home. “I save all the goody-bag candy that I’d rather they didn’t eat and the toys that they forget about immediately. Then I use them for piñata filler at their own parties,” she says. Bonus: The piñata acts as an activity and its fillings as favors. Find piñatas for less than $20 each at orientaltrading.com.

Streamline the swag bag. These trinkets are usually sold in sets; divide them up for affordable party favors that are way better than your average birthday goody bag:

•  Bright-Colored Wooden Yo-yos ($13 for 12)
•  Balloon Helicopter Classroom Pack ($12 for 12)
•  Way to Celebrate Punch Balloons, Multi-Color ($2 for four)
•  Mr. Men 40th Anniversary Box Set ($14 for 10 books)
•  Titta Djur finger puppets ($5 for 10)
•  Crayola Crayons ($8 for 96)

Make a semi-homemade cake. Karen Tack, coauthor of Cake My Day!, suggests baking an inexpensive box mix, but substituting buttermilk for the water for a firmer, less-sweet cake. Then frost the cake with a homemade buttercream, combining milk, unsalted butter, vanilla, and confectioners' sugar (many boxes of sugar contain the recipe).

• RELATED: 10 Creative Birthday Cakes

Entertainment

Tap your network. For kids' birthday party entertainment, think about your personal connections and community resources, suggest Steve and Annette Economides, of MoneySmartFamily.com. For example, the couple once asked a friend who is a police officer to come to one of their son’s parties in uniform; likewise, their local college has bowling lanes where rounds were less than half the price of the commercial bowling alley.

Choose crafts that double as favors. Try a personalized craft activity; it eliminates the need for hired entertainment and takes the place of a costly goody bag. “I type ‘blank’ or ‘DIY’ on party-supply sites, to see what comes up,” says Levine, who suggests you pick something related to your kids' birthday party theme—whether it’s plain tote bags or white umbrellas.

Elevate the everyday. Take advantage of kids’ vivid imagination, suggest Steve and Annette Economides, who say one of their most successful party games was a treasure hunt for “gold” (spray-painted rocks) that the kids took home as favors.

• RELATED: How to Make a Birthday Treasure Hunt for Kids

Embrace no-cost activities. Instead of hired entertainment, be prepared with a few free activities like these birthday party games for kids:

• Freeze Dance
• Keep-Up-the-Balloon
• Musical Chairs
• Hot Potato
• Charades
• Red Rover
• Three-Legged Race
• Duck, Duck, Goose
• “Button, button, who’s got the button?”
• “Simon says”

Utilize your library for free media. For a free activity, borrow books, videos, and DVDs from the library that correspond to your party’s theme. Story time is an especially good way to calm preschoolers down after physically active games.

Parents Magazine

• By Laura Fenton