Ideas for a birthday Party on a budget ?? - It will be our son's FIRST birthday

I've got a number of friend and they have all said, "Don't bother to do anything big for birthday 1. They won't remember it anyway" In fact scientists claim that the first three years of a kids life are really blurry and come to think of it, do you remember your first birthday at this point. I would say, surround them with love, family and friends. That doesn't cost a thing.

most children do not remember first second or even third birthdays, so you do not have to go overboard for his sake.A cake with a candle would be nice and can be purchased at the day old counter at most supermarkets for less than half the price of a fresh one. as well a cake mix and ice cream will work as well. If you have friends over it can be cake and coffee for the adults and cake and cool aid for the kids, as for a gift a small toy from the dollar store will suffice. and stop with the guilt trips you are doing the best you can with circumstances that permit. All will be well

No matter what you do, your son is not likely to remember much except maybe crying over the cake...so you might want to consider that in your planning! :) Make sure he gets to play in the cake whatever you do...it's the most fun he will probably have...that is actually birthday related! LOL I think the amount you spend is directly related to how much people you invite...so you should definitely trim the guest list if you want to save! If it's just you and your spouse and your son, then saving will have to be on the decorations and on the amount of money you spend on the cake! You could try baking it yourself if you feel you are up to it...or get grandma to donate...although you would have to invite her then...so if you weren't planning on inviting her, that could prove to be "sticky", no pun intended! :) If I wanted to save money on beverages I would avoid serving expensive fruit juices and stick to iced teas, which you can make very cheaply yourself, or fruit-flavoured water like they mention in the book "Green parties" (I forgot who the author is)...and I think it was on GMA. You can save on food cost by serving small sandwiches instead of an actual big dinner meal...and I guess timing is important for this to work, because if you invite people around dinner time, they might expect dinner! :) For "cheap" memories, you can get a hold of a digital camera to take photos and then only print the ones you like, and if you use an online printing service, you may actually save by getting free prints for signing up...(usually they do that, if not there is always the referral, which I can send you) but that's not going to save you a whole lot. I typed in "cheap party ideas" on blackle.com and the first link was a page full of tips to help you save...you could try that search and/or similar searches to get some useful tips. I hope you have a blast and make memories to last forever!!

ok, i understand that it's not that easy to have a good party with a very strict budget..my daughter's first birthday was a good party with lots of children but with a very budgeted food..we have cake, one dozen of balloons, 2kls of spaghetti, bread, hotdogs on a stick and juice and some candies for give aways..it's just like that..we don't invite lots of children, it's just children of my closed friends and other neighbors and relatives, but all was happy and contented..it's just a children party, more children are there than mothers...hope it can help you..good luck..

We just celebrated my daughter's 4th birthday party a couple of weeks ago. We had it in one of the restaurants here in the Philippines that served kiddie parties. We spent about 6000pesos, that would be a little less than 150USD. It was a simple party, the food didn't cost that much, there was a small birthday cake, birthday party hats and some giveaways too. The best thing in that party was the mascot that joined the party, because that was made all the kids enjoy the party, most especially my baby! Here's a little video of that party where everyone had fun! http://www.paulynramirez.com/a-jollibee-birthday-party-the-video-clip/

We've had a small budget for my daughters birthdays as well. A big thing I've done to save money is to have her parties at my house. This saves on having to rent a place. If you are planning on having a theme for his party just buy one pack of plates, napkins, etc. If you need anymore then that just go the cheap route and buy the extra from the dollar store. I promise noone will care. And try to plan the party at a time when you don't have to serve a lot of food. We are having my daughters party at 3 in the afternoon. That way everyone will have already had lunch and it won't be quite time for dinner. I'm just going to slide by on cheap appetizers. And if anyone offers to bring anything take them up on it.