One Year Birthday Party

Hopefully it's not to late to respond. For my son's 1st birthday I made all HIS favorite foods (he was an early eater!) I made chicken fries (from schwann's), macaroni and cheese (homemade, look up recipes on www.allrecipes.com or www.foodnetwork.com) I made an adult one and a kids version, BB salad (frog eyed salad) and watermelon.
We then did a smash cake for him and I had Harmons do a cupcake cake in the shape of a crown because we did a prince theme.
Hopefully that give you some suggestions! Good luck!

One thing I like to do for my little kids birthday party's is buy the cheap sippy cups from Wal-Mart or Walgreens, the Nuby brand only costs a dollar and they have a stopper in them and they work great (and they are colorful). Write each child's name on one of the cups and have stickers and things like that that the little one's can decorate their cup with. This way you have a cup for every child (just in case their parent's forgot one) and it's a little party favor too. Also, as for any party, keep it so that you can relax and enjoy yourself once the guests arrive. It's no fun for anyone when the parent's of the birthday child is running around like a mad person getting food and such together. So, keep it easy. We did Mexican food for my daughter's first birthday. We had stuff to make tacos/burritos (which the stuffing stuff was great for finger foods for the kids), we had taquitos (very easy and the favorite food for everyone) you can buy them bulk at Costco, just canned peaches (again kid food), ... We had the food ready when everyone arrived and that way people could mingle and eat for a while and we kept it easy for seating arrangements, we put a disposable/plastic table cloth on the floor for the kids to eat on and they could be messy as usual :) . You can put some kid music on in the background and have posters consisting of pictures of your little one over the year. Anyways, just some ideas. Have fun!!!

On my daughter's birthday, all the one year olds sat at a little table together, each with their own cupcake, and we watched as they all ate them using their unique and funny methods. Some just dug right in and some picked the frosting off. Tell all the parents to grab a camera and gather around for some laughs! Also, I think it would be cute to serve toddler food (boxes of raisins, crackers, cheese sticks) on trays like hoursdevors.

For my daughters 1st birthday we did pizza. Then for the cake I got a Wilton Butterfly Cake Pan. I had a lot of family here so I also made cupcakes with strawberry butterflies. Then for her cake I used a custard cup and made a ladybug cake just for her. I hope this helps. Oh and Wal Mart in their party section has stuff for first birthday parties. Includes a disposable bib, decorations, hat, highchair decorations, candles, ect....

Depending on where you live weather wise. We rented a spot at the local park real cheap I think it was $25.00 for 4 hours. Have hamburgers and hot dogs for the kids. Eat, open gifts, and have cake. Little favors for the kids age appropriate and the kids played on the toys at the park, so we didn't have any games. We bought her cake at Albertson's and if you bought a big cake they gave us her own cake for free. Also we have had our kids birthdays at pizza places at no charge just call and reserve the room. We bought the pizza, drinks, and gave the kids tokens to play games. Best of all no real major clean up. I hope this helps with all the kids being around one it might not work, but this is what we did. The first birthday I think is the best of all. Hope this helps good luck.

An excellent source for great ideas is www.birthdaypartyideas.com
Have fun!!!

I don't know if her birthday has past already but I saw an idea I might do for my daughter who is turning one in November. They filled a small blue swimming pool with cake, kind of like a cake city, and put her in the middle, kind of like Godzilla. I didn't know if I liked the idea or not until I watched my daughter playing in the sand box and imagined it was cake instead. I think she would love it and it is something you can only do for the first b-day. I am also going to make pumpkins on a vine (I haven't figured out how yet) and string them along one wall with a picture in each pumpkin from each month. As far as food, I think you have gotten some great suggestions from others that I might steal too! Good luck!

A fun birthday cake for your party could be a caterpillar cup cake one. They are really simple to make. Just make about 10 cupcakes or so and line them up in a line (you can curve them to make it look like it is walking). Then you can use candy or fruit to make the eyes, feet, and intenas. It makes it easy for servings and is cute!

For a cake - I didn't want all the sugar that is in "normal" cakes, so I made a pumpkin apple cake with cream cheese frosting. It was delicious, and much healthier than most cakes. Even my please-feed-me-chocolate friends liked it.

My kids FAVORITE things at their first b-day parties were the balloons. We bought a big bag of balloons and blew them up and made a balloon pit in the living room. The little ones went nuts over it. Another thing that we did was to ask for "consumable" gifts, like gift certificates. Rather than getting a bunch of toys that we didn't have room for and that would be broken in a few months, we were able to get a yearlong pass to the Denver Zoo, and a yearlong pass to a local petting zoo. If your daughter has a favorite place to play, like Pump It Up, those also make fun gift certificates.

At this age, keep the party simple, and keep it fairly short. Make sure that it is after your little one's nap. When she gets burned out with all the excitement and guests (and she probably will!), have somewhere quiet that she can retreat with you or Daddy. Also, I designated someone to take pictures, which was a huge help when I was coordinating things or when I wanted to be in some of the pictures.

Best of luck, and Happy Birthday!

Cheers,
S.

Check with your local grocery stores, a lot of them will give you a small 1st bday cake for free, or at least the stores around here do. That way you can give it to your daughter and let her have at it.
With a bunch of one year olds, I wouldn't think you needed to do too much! Your daughter won't remember a thing and be more into the cake and wrapping paper, hee hee.
Pizza is a good one, a giant sub from a local delit, that way the babies can chew on the crust or have tiny bites and you aren't doing a lot of cooking, chili for grown ups over fritos and have cheese, sour cream and diced onions to garnish.
Maybe have some fun and entertaining DVDS to play for the babies! Happy birthday! It is so fun watching them dive into the cake for the first time, and messy but fun to watch!