It’s always a toss up on whether it will be hot or cold for Collin’s December birthday party. It was freezing last year, but we were hopeful it would be warmer this year – especially since it would be an afternoon party. Collin really wanted to have the bouncy house at his party and we could only do it if we had the party outside. Sadly, the forecast showed it would be freezing and we decided to move everything inside. 

THEME

After our Disney cruise, Collin said he wanted a Spider-Man birthday party. Shortly after, he asked for a golf birthday party. Then a few weeks later, he asked for Spider-Man again and that one seemed to stick. I always get nervous planning birthday parties months in advance in case the kids change the theme they want, but I’m glad he decided on Spider-Man! He browsed Pinterest with me and pretty much loved every idea he saw, but I helped him make it more realistic to what I knew we could do.

DECORATIONS

I ordered a blue tablecloth months ago that would fit the table we use outside. When we changed everything to an inside party, I was praying it would fit our breakfast table so we wouldn’t have to move it outside. Thankfully, it was stretchy and a perfect fit!

We saw a Spider-Man with the face cut out and instead of buying one, I wanted to make it myself. I made one back in September.It was a little short because Collin had a growth spurt between me measuring him and painting it. Sadly, while I was in Greece, Collin decided to rip it apart (he had a hard time with me being away). I probably could have glued it back together, but I made a new one so I could make it taller.

Collin is starting to have his own opinion and ideas on what he wants for his parties. He noticed that Camryn had a banner and balloons at her party, so he said he had to have those too. I had already made his banner by the time he asked for one. We also did the traditional number-shaped photos. I surprised Collin with a balloon spider in one of the wall corners and he loved it!

My friend, Ellen, came to the rescue letting us borrow her kid-sized table and chairs! I used AI to convert a picture of Collin into a coloring page for the kids to color. The coloring kept the kids occupied for about three minutes, but I thought it was super cute!

FOOD

Collin loves fruit, so I made an arrangement of strawberries, blueberries, and marshmallows to look like Spider-Man’s face (thanks, Pinterest!). He also asked for pretzel sticks, themed cookies, and a lemon cake with Spidey webs. 

I had planned on doing some kind of red punch and blue punch, but Collin requested apple juice instead. I thought it would be fun to do the character juices with Spider-Man’s head, but I didn’t think of it soon enough. They wouldn’t arrive in time if I ordered them and there wouldn’t have been enough at our Walmart. We bought the Honest Kids Apple juice and Collin loved it!

GAMES

Since we couldn’t use the bouncy house, I wanted to come up with a couple of games to keep the kids entertained inside. We made a “web course” in the hallway using red streamers and tape. It only took the kids about two seconds to realize that all they had to do was slide under all of the “webs” to get to the other side.

The next game was some tape attached to a hoop to look like a spider web. We had the kids throw cotton balls at it and they were surprisingly good at getting them on the sticky part of the tape! Even the big kids wanted to throw cotton balls, so I’d say it was a hit.

We had the best time celebrating our friendly neighborhood birthday boy!

Collin wanted to do some fun pictures in his Spider-Man costume. I’ll never turn my kids down when they ASK to take pictures!

His one request was a picture of him upside down and me kissing him. He said this was his favorite one of all of them 🥹

Since his birthday was a few days before the party, he got to open his presents a little early. He got exactly what he wanted – a Spider-Man action figure and a Spider stuffy.

The Creative Team:

Cake: Phyllis Davis

Cookies: Summer Brown