A Birthday Experience
For my son’s astronaut themed 5th birthday party, we started the day with a visit to The Museum of Flight in Seattle to see the Destination Moon: The Apollo 11 Mission exhibition. This year is the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing, so there have been lots of special tributes to that moment. Well the timing could not be more perfect, as our now five-year-old is Apollo obsessed! He insisted on wearing his astronaut costume to the museum, of course. Combining an experience like this with a small, simple party or using the experience as a replacement of a physical gift can help keep waste low while still making the day special.
Meal
We met guests back at our home that evening for dinner and cake. I made homemade veggie burgers using this recipe from Nora Cooks. They were delicious and grilled really well. Our family has been vegetarian for a few months now for environmental and health reasons and I don’t find that I miss meat at all. It has surprisingly been an easy transition for all of us. We used cloth napkins, porcelain plates, and a combination of stainless steel flatware and disposable wooden cutlery.
Favors
For favors, I used these space-themed cloth marble bags. I found them at our local toy store, but I think they would be fairly easy to make as well. I love that the kids can use them again and again for marbles, or anything really. Inside the bags I included homemade “galaxy dough”, marbles from the Dollar Tree, and stickers, also from the Dollar Tree. While the favors were very affordable, they could have been much more sustainable. I hesitated to put glitter in the dough to represent stars, but I went ahead and did it, and I wish I hadn’t! I did use glitter that I already had, and I made sure that when my kids played with theirs, I collected the glitter and threw it in the trash, rather than letting it go down the drain and into the water system. If I were to do it again, I would try to think of an alternative to the galaxy dough and the stickers. I’m so over plastic!
Although I did feel a sense of guilt using the glitter, I’m choosing to do what I can for now and learn from the experience for next time. I recently checked out All You Need is Less: The Eco-Friendly Guide to Guilt-Free Green Living and Stress-Free Simplicity by Madeleine Somerville. She recommends, “Be gentle in your self-talk, and don’t spend your days chastising yourself for all the things you are not doing, instead of recognizing all that you are.” Thanks, Madeleine, I needed that reminder.
Backdrop
A positive step I did take toward sustainability for this party was to replace balloons with paper lantern globes. I used them to represent planets in front of a black starry backdrop. I made the backdrop by stringing Christmas tree lights, which I already had, behind a pair of black semi-sheer curtains that I bought at Goodwill. As I have shared in a previous post, my mom is a pastry chef and always makes my kids’ birthday cakes and cookies. Her desserts always serve as a main part of the decoration in themselves!
Homemade Touches
I sewed fabric bunting in a space print. He now has it hanging in his room as a decoration. The fabric bunting is something I started this year to honor each child on his or her birthday. I briefly describe my process in my Upcycled Fabric Bunting for Mom’s Spring Birthday post.
I also made a giant space shuttle for the kids to play in. I started by asking for a large cardboard box on my local Buy Nothing Facebook. Buy Nothing groups are so wonderful for projects and parties. You can almost always find all different sizes of cardboard boxes and so many other random useful things. You can also donate your used items such as party supplies there to make sure they get as much use as possible while keeping your home clutter-free! The box was from a porch swing someone in my neighborhood had bought. She and her husband were so friendly and helped me tie it down when I couldn’t close the back of my car. I sent her a picture of the finished product to thank her. My son seemed to really enjoy the space shuttle. I actually had to lower it down through the upstairs window to get it from my craft room to the back yard! The things we do for our children!
Activity
In addition to the cardboard space shuttle, I put together a simple sensory bin with sand and astronauts. I plan to donate the little astronauts to the kids’ preschool when we are done with them and reuse the sand for other sensory bins. I also checked out several astronaut books at the library for kids to read when they needed a moment of calm.
Invitations
I used this online invitation from Paperless Post. It is called Space Case by Meri Meri. Just a warning, I did pay $10 + tax to send it to five recipients. Some of Paperless Post’s online invitations are free, while some require you to purchase “coins”. To me, it was worth it for this one.
Balance
I continue to feel that I have an irrational need to go over the top with birthday parties. I have scaled back the number of guests, the money we spend, and the impact we make since my oldest son’s first birthday party, but I think I still have a long way to go. This was a step in the process, and a good time was had by all, especially our bright little birthday boy.
