Evan’s Dinosaur Birthday

This post contains affiliate links.

I asked Evan want kind of party he wanted for his 3rd birthday and he said “Dinosaurs”. I told him he could have anything he wanted – trucks, trains, pirates, diggers, ANYTHING – and he said “Dinosaurs”. So we went with a dinosaur birthday. It ended up being an excellent and fun birthday theme.


Dinosaur Birthday

Dinosaur Birthday

Dinosaur Birthday

Dinosaur Birthday

Dinosaur Birthday

Dinosaur Birthday

It seems that no matter how much I try to stick to a color scheme I always end up with ALL THE COLORS. But since according to Dino Dan the dinosaurs WERE all the colors I figured I was safe as long as I toned it down with some natural accents. I got lots of moss, fake leaves, and branches from places like the craft store and the dollar store. All the tablecloths are cut from one big roll of burlap I bought in the garden department at Lowes. I made a zillion dinosaur “terrariums” (an idea I got from Mandy) with a bag of garden rocks (also from Lowes – $5 and I barely used 1/10th of them!) moss and tiny dinos left over from the favor boxes. The backdrop to the food table is two rolls of cork I bought at JoAnn’s. I cut every triangle pennant by hand with pinking sheers and printed the banners on my little printer.

For food, I had three sections: carnivores, herbivores and dessertivores. I thought I was pretty cute and clever, until I started looking at dino party supplies on Etsy and saw I was DEFINITELY not the first person to come up with “dessertivores”. It was still cute.

Menu:

Dinosaur shaped sandwiches (PB&J and cucumber)
Dinosaur shaped chicken nuggets
Mini hot dogs
Mozzarella sticks
Fruit
Individual hummus and veggie cups

Ice Age punch (blue punch with tiny dinos frozen into ice cubes floating in it)
Juice for the kiddos

Dessert Menu:

Brownies
Fossil cookies (I made mine with almonds)
Cereal bar “bones”
No-bake nest cookies (I did peanut butter & chocolate)
Dirt pudding cups (chocolate pudding & crushes Oreos)
Dinosaur shortbread cookies with royal icing
White wedding cupcakes with cream cheese cake batter frosting
Dino fruit snacks and candy eggs

And an AMAZING cake made by my friend Heather (I HIGHLY recommend her if you’re in the Eastern CT area and would be happy to put you in touch with her)

Since Evan and his friends are all old enough now for games and activities but the thought of trying to wrangle 25 kids into organized activities makes me break out in hives I planned lots of free-play fun.

We filled our old kiddie pool with sand for a fossil dig and hid tons of green eggs filled with stickers and candy for a dinosaur egg hunt. I also ordered a couple of inexpensive dinosaur coloring books from Amazon and dinosaur shaped crayons for a quiet, inside activity.

A few more details:

I saw dino party hats on Pinterest but didn’t really have enough ambition to make them from scratch. Just a few days before the party Evan said he NEEDED party hats so I dragged last year’s 2nd birthday party hats from Target out of my paper goods storage box and turned them into dino hats. It was really easy – they’re folded together with a tab, not glue or tape, so I just opened them flat, cut a piece of colored paper into a “spine”, cut a slot in the spine for the tab and reassembled with a little tape to reinforce it. I did a terrible job of explaining that, but trust me – if you take a look at a store-bought party hat you will definitely see how easy this is.

Between the hats and the masks we had quite a few tiny dinosaurs terrorizing the party.

My friend Amanda mailed me these leggings 2 seconds after I said we were doing a dinosaur party. So perfect!

Brilliant idea I stole from my friend Cheri – Take’n’toss cups for all the kids. No worries about juice or punch spills on my floors and they’re cheap enough to toss out if they get ruined.

Adorable invitations designed by the very talented Denae at New Mom Survival Adventure and printed (as rounded-corner post cards) by Overnight Prints – an idea I got from Tam.

I think that’s everything! Scroll to the bottom of this post for links to where I got stuff and as always let me know if you have any questions. I’m more than happy to share and info!

OK, just a few more pictures (the not awesome ones were taken by me)…

Resources and Sources:

Pinterest party board
for inspiration
Template for straw flags
Custom stamp from Tickled Pink Paper + Ink
Paper straws & favor supplies from In The Clear
Evan’s dino shirt – Gymboree
Photography by Open Shutter (Website)

Dinosaur stickers
– Amazon
Dinosaur cookie cutters – Amazon
Dinosaur sandwich cutter – Amazon
Dinosaur coloring books – Amazon
Melissa & Doug dinosaur stamps – Amazon
Dinosaur cupcake wrappers & toppers – Amazon
Dinosaur banner (I disassembled half to put on my cork backdrop) – Amazon
Dinosaur skeletons for fossil dig – Amazon and Oriental Trading (cheaper from Amazon)
Dinosaur masks – Oriental Trading Company
Dinosaur crayons – Oriental Trading Company
Dinosaur candies – Oriental Trading Company
Inflatable dinosaurs – Oriental Trading Company
Giant inflatable T-Rex – Amazon
Brown paper bags – Oriental Trading Company

Let me know if you see anything I missed or forgot to link!

(Oh and in case you are confused compared to previous party set-ups, we rearranged the house a few weeks ago and flipped the dining/family rooms. I was worried it wouldn’t be a good for the party but it was great! With the new set-up – and the patio – I have tons of space to invite even more people next time.)

Thank you to everyone who came and made our day so special!

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

40 Responses to “Evan’s Dinosaur Birthday”

  1. Hi. You throw the best parties EVER. Seriously girl, you have crazy party-throwing skills. I love it!

  2. Such a great party!!!!!!! Happy Birthday Evan!

  3. Audrey says:

    Amazing! Good job!

  4. Leah says:

    OH MY GOD. Will you stoppit with the being so amazing? You make the rest of us w ho haven’t even begun to plan our daughter’s first birthday feel so, so bad.

    Also, Wren needs a paid of those dino legging post haste.

  5. How fun! Send me a picture of the invites (if you have any left). I am dying to see it with rounded corners! I wish we could plan activities for Elena’s 1st but that seem silly for babies. Babies that we are still trying to prevent from accidently clawing each other’s eye’s out.

    • bebehblog says:

      Ah, I totally meant to include an invite shot! Hold on, I’ll add it. At Evan’s 1st we had a bean bag toss and coloring pages, but not much else. There’s no WAY to herd one year olds into anything they don’t want to do.

  6. molly says:

    OMG. So totally adorable. Brigham loves dinosaurs. He would have walked in and fell over with excitement. As always, you are so detailed and creative. Congrats on another super kids party!

  7. raincheckmom says:

    Love it! The dinosaur fruit tray – so clever…

    AND the cupcakes
    AND the cookies
    AND the inflatable dinosaur
    AND AND AND!

  8. You are SO FREAKING GOOD at this! So when are you opening your business? Seriously.

  9. Meagan says:

    What an awesome party!! I love everything about it! We did my 3 yr old’s party at the flight museum last month, and I kept wishing we’d done a party at home. :( It’s just so much more special and personal. You did a fantastic job! I might just steal your dino ideas for the 4th birthday! I mean really, amazing job!

  10. Sarah-Anne says:

    I say this every.single.time you throw a party…but it’s SO worth repeating. You are great at planning parties!!

  11. MomEinstein says:

    Your party looks AMAZING. I love the postcard invitations. Such a great idea. And the dino fruit tray.

  12. OMG. Please come out here to wine country for Drew’s 3rd birthday and make it fabulous. I’ll give you wine if you do. Pretty please!!??

  13. Jennie says:

    TOO FLIPPIN ADORABLE!

  14. Amanda says:

    Freakin fantastic as always! Want to throw a party for my birthday??

  15. Joanna says:

    What an amazing party! I want to be your in real life friend!

  16. Heather says:

    It absolutely was well thought out, fun and so darn creative!!! YOU NEED to get yourself a Cricut I tell you!!! Thanks for showing my cake, the pics made it look really cool ;)

    • bebehblog says:

      Heather, I’d link your cake to your Facebook but I’m not sure you wanted your full name out there! But if you have a business or an email you want to share I’d happily post it – the cake really was AMAZING.

  17. merin says:

    The party really was fantastic Suzanne. And Erin-as usual-your pictures are awesome! Thank you so much for including us in Evan’s special day!

    • Erin says:

      Thanks Merin! It was great too see you and Cora again and to meet Cammie (so adorable)! Thanks again for being Reid’s favorite and taking care of him the whole time! :)

  18. Shari says:

    I bow down to your party planning prowess.

  19. Andrea says:

    Hi, nice to meet you – I’m afraid we can’t be friends.

    Holy CRAP you are awesome. This party is beautiful. Can you throw my next birthday bash? Seriously. LOVE it all.

  20. Emily says:

    This is so cool! How much fun, both for kids and the parents! I LOVE the dino masks as a garland… so creative! Also, I’m taking notes on the kid-friendly ideas like the cups of veggies and dip, and take/toss drinks… brilliant! Everything about this party is brilliant and creative!

  21. Suz says:

    Best party thrower ever Suzanne! Awesome details & looks like everyone had such a great time.

    Oh & send the leftover desserts {yes, all of them} my way ~ they looked delicious!

  22. Becca says:

    This is AMAZING! I loooove all the little details. Such a fun & perfect party, GOOD JOB mama!!!!

  23. Wow. Wow wow wow. I am SO blown away! This looks fantastic! And like so much fun.

  24. Cole says:

    SO awesome. I can’t wait for Mommy to steal all of your ideas for my party this summer!

  25. Sarah says:

    The party was absolutely adorable. I loved your attention to every last detail! Thanks so much for including a link to my straw flag template—your straw flags looked great!

  26. Tracy K says:

    While web surfing looking for ideas I found your blog. OMG love all the cute ideas you came up with. My daughter is turning 3 in April and she has been asking me for a Dino Party I have bought a few things from oriental trading and after looking at all your pictures I see most of the stuff I got in your pictures and now have a better idea on how to use all the stuff. Looks like your party was a big success hopefully the one I have will be as muchfun as your appears to have been. Looks like this was last year. So Happy 4th Bday to your son. Thanks for all the great ideas.

  27. Gina Graves says:

    I love the dinosaur fruit tray! What a nice party! Very well done. I am working on getting an entire section of http://www.DinosaurToysSuperstore.com to include all the fantastic dinosaur birthday party ideas for parents. Your fruit tray is just the best. I’m going out to buy fruit right now and recreate it! Thank you!

  28. LJ says:

    Thank for you for the fantastic ideas. Truly inspirational.

  29. Ileana says:

    You did such an amazing job! Such amazing detail. Thank you for inspiring such wonderful ideas. Can’t wait to see what you will do next.

  30. Melissa says:

    This party is AMAZING!! I love it, and even took a few of your ideas. I live near central ct and would love to talk to your friend about a possible cake. Please email me. Thanks. Again, great job on the party.

  31. Lindsay says:

    So cute. Where did you get the cups?

  32. Sharon says:

    Thanks for the inspiration for my son’s first birthday! You have amazing attention to detail. Just wondering – what chocolate pudding recipe you used in the dirt pudding cups?

    • bebehblog says:

      I’m pretty sure it’s just Jello instant chocoalte pudding. I don’t remember pinning anything fancy, so that’s probably what I did!

  33. Sangini says:

    Awesome party ideas! I live in CT — can I get info on the cake and possibly ordering one for my son’s party?!

    • bebehblog says:

      The cake was made by my friend Heather, who has since had some major life and career changes and I’m afraid she doesn’t do custom cakes anymore! I’m sorry!

Leave a Reply

CommentLuv badge