2 Year Old Bday Party - Kid or Adult Focused?

[BayGirl2]

For DS's first birthday party we invited our friends (many of whom have similar aged babies) and had a big BBQ. There was kid food but no kid-specific entertainment and it was in our yard - more adult focused. We're 3 months away from his 2nd birthday and I'm seeing friends start to do things at places like Chuck E Cheese or a children's museum or bring in entertainment - what I consider a kid-focused party. 2 seems young to really enjoy some of those venues. We're also debating whether we invite kids his age only (with parents), or just invite our friends (with or w/o kids) like last year. Seems like 3 and over is when kids really start to care about this stuff, have opinions, and want certain friends present, but maybe I'm underestimating.

A few questions on what you do/did for a 2 year old:

- Did you invite daycare/preschool/playgroup kids whose parents you are not close to?
- Did you invite non-family adults without kids?
- Did you hold it at a kid-activity place or bring in an entertainer? If so, what kind?
- Was your 2 year old really aware of the party and did they have an opinion on any of this, or was it more about the parents?
- And just out of curiosity, was there a theme? Any great age appropriate non-branded, non-TV them ideas?

[Smillow]

A few questions on what you do/did for a 2 year old:

- Did you invite daycare/preschool/playgroup kids whose parents you are not close to? No
- Did you invite non-family adults without kids? No
- Did you hold it at a kid-activity place or bring in an entertainer? If so, what kind? No
- Was your 2 year old really aware of the party and did they have an opinion on any of this, or was it more about the parents? He knew it was special but not necessarily about him.
- And just out of curiosity, was there a theme? Any great age appropriate non-branded, non-TV them ideas? I made a Thomas cake & used Thomas napkins & plates.

We had a relatives only 4 pm party @ Cheeburger, Cheeburger. It wasn't a party except that I brought a cake & relatives brought gifts (I checked with the manager before hand). It was DS, me, DH, 3 Aunts, 2 Uncles & Grandma. I had a good time & DS had a great time & we caught up with everyone (we traveled oot). I handed out Mardi Gras beads to everyone & made a little favor bag with $1 items from Michaels.

[Pear]

We had DD's 2nd birthday party today. We just had a family party at home. This comes built in with several cousins. We ate some easy food, the kids ran around, then we had cake. It was nothing fancy. I think it was fairly kid focused since we mostly watched the kids play. My guess is we will do something similar for 3.

[Pear]

My 2 year old was very aware it was her party. She kept wanting it to start the day before when we were setting up decorations.
Our theme was 'color'. I like loose themes. I did crayons as favors.

[smiles33]

We just had a family party at home. This comes built in with several cousins. We ate some easy food, the kids ran around, then we had cake. It was nothing fancy. I think it was fairly kid focused since we mostly watched the kids play. My guess is we will do something similar for 3.

:yeahthat: except my DC are the only kids so it was more adult-oriented. No kiddie friends were invited until age 4.

[Katigre]

We only do family birthday parties at people's homes.

[lalasmama]

- Did you invite daycare/preschool/playgroup kids whose parents you are not close to?

She wasn't close to any non-family kids, so none were invited.

- Did you invite non-family adults without kids?

Same thing, she didn't know non-family adults, really.

- Did you hold it at a kid-activity place or bring in an entertainer? If so, what kind?

We went to a "family fun center" which was more or less a place with an arcade, kids' climbing area, putt-putt golf, and a few other things. We had a wide spread in kids ages (from the 2yo bday girl to teenage cousins). Definately a kid-centric place, but, I think, needed due to the spread of ages.

- Was your 2 year old really aware of the party and did they have an opinion on any of this, or was it more about the parents?

She was freaked out by most of it, and wasn't sure what to think. She had baby-monkey-death-grip going for a lot of it.

- And just out of curiosity, was there a theme? Any great age appropriate non-branded, non-TV them ideas?

We went for "Melmo" (aka Elmo), because he was her favorite.

My neice had a Nemo 2nd b-day, without knowing who Nemo was, more or less making it a fish birthday. PB&J sandwiches cut with fish cookie cutters, goldfish crackers, magnetic "fishing" game to choose a prize, etc. Actually, I think the only "Nemo" things were a blanket from her mom, and candy wrappers.

Other ideas... Balloons, animals. We usually try to do solid plates, and themed decorations, mainly because I'm cheap like that :)

[SkyrMommy]

Thanks for posting this... DD's 2nd birthday is also coming up soon & I'm not sure what to do either.

I like the idea of having it still at home with a bit more decorations, games and fun for the family, but she's the only little in our family and we'll only have a few of her close 'play' friends over.

[jenfromnj]

It's funny you should ask this now, DS's 2nd birthday party is next weekend and we had a massive debate about the very same issues here! I hated to just have it at a typical restaurant and force everyone to stay in their seats for 3 hours, but after checking out some playplace type places, we weren't sure that was the best direction to take for our largely 3-and-under set.

We ended up with kind of a middle ground--we are having it at a favorite restaurant of ours, a casual local place, but renting out the upstairs, so the kids can roam around without bothering anyone else, and we're also having a kid craft/activity table, and a balloon artist and face painter come to break things up.





A few questions on what you do/did for a 2 year old:

- Did you invite daycare/preschool/playgroup kids whose parents you are not close to? No, but DS isn't yet in preschool/daycare, so his friends are the kids of our friends so far.
- Did you invite non-family adults without kids?We did, but really just because some of our closest friends don't have kids but they love kids and enjoy hanging with DS and our other friends' kids.
- Did you hold it at a kid-activity place or bring in an entertainer? If so, what kind? A face painter and a balloon artist, as well as a craft and activity area for the kids to make crafts (MYO picture frames, color your own tote bags, tissue paper/pipecleaner flower kit, that kind of thing, and some paper/crayons/markers/stickers--I picked up a bunch of craft kits from Amazon and on clearance from Land of Nod.
- Was your 2 year old really aware of the party and did they have an opinion on any of this, or was it more about the parents? I'll let you know this time next week!
- And just out of curiosity, was there a theme? Any great age appropriate non-branded, non-TV them ideas?DS loves robots right now, so we are doing a robot theme (generic, not Wall-E or anything).

[sunshine873]

We just had DDs 2nd a few months ago. Here are my answers to your questions:

Did you invite daycare/preschool/playgroup kids whose parents you are not close to? No. We invited neighborhood kids that she plays with & loves.

- Did you invite non-family adults without kids? Not this time. Her 1st party was a HUGE celebration & I was trying to pull this one back a bit. That was one of the 1st places to pare down the list.

- Did you hold it at a kid-activity place or bring in an entertainer? If so, what kind? No. DD is at the point where she just really enjoys having people around to play with, so all of that would have been a little over-kill. Again, I was trying to keep it simple. We had an afternoon party at home. Decorated with streamers & balloons. Snack-type food that would appeal to both kids and adults (meatballs, veggies, fruit, chips, goldfish & cupcakes.)

- Was your 2 year old really aware of the party and did they have an opinion on any of this, or was it more about the parents? She definitely was aware of the party. But didn't have an opinion. It's not like she thinks this stuff through yet. We decorated while she was taking her nap. So when she woke up, she was in awe by the streamers & all important balloons. Then people started showing up & she just had a blast running around with the other kids, playing with balloons, etc. I wasn't planning on any games, because I didn't think she'd "get it" but at the last minute decided to do pin the nose on Elmo. She watched a few of the older kids do it & then she understood. She loved it, and I was glad I added it in. It felt more party-like.

- And just out of curiosity, was there a theme? Any great age appropriate non-branded, non-TV them ideas? Our theme was "Elmo." It's one of the few characters out there that she truly gets excited about. The life-size Elmo balloon was the hit of the day with young & old. But, if you're looking for non-TV, how about balloons, Teddy Bears, butterflies, lady bugs or flowers.
__________________

[catsnkid]

Same question coming up soon! we just started to talk about it. I wanted a first birthday party especially since it was such a ride the first year.. lots of illnesses, pneumonia, ear infections etc and wanted to commemorate the whole thing as well as thank the family & friends who went through it with us. There were no other kids.
I am thinking no little friends yet, they are just too small. I don't think any of his friends are doing that yet. Maybe just one. So far we have just been invited to a 4 year old's party who has a little brother about 6 mos younger. I have heard that rule of thumb is one friend for year of age! I like the crayon theme idea! I don't really want to have another party like last year, wanted to tone it down but I don't know!

[BayGirl2]

Glad I'm not the only one with this dilemma! Recently we were invited to a daycare classmates 1st bday at Chuck e Cheese. That seemed weird to me - the mom works at the daycare so I see her, but she's in a different room so not any more than any other parent. We decided we aren't ready for CEC yet and didn't go. I can see us inviting one classmate whose parents we know and like, but it feels to early for the "invite the entire class" concept. We're very social and like to entertain but not sure I want the same scale as last year.

I'm also debating if entertainment is necessary or if under 3's will be ok just playing. For his first we had a balloon theme. "Melmo" is also the only character he loves, but not sure if DH and I could tolerate that much Elmo. ;-). Immediate family and neighbors and kid friends will be at least 25, so unless we do a separate family party and kid party, it will be big. But we have enough space that paying for pump it up or a similar venue at this age seems like overkill.

[elephantmeg]

- Did you invite daycare/preschool/playgroup kids whose parents you are not close to?
no
- Did you invite non-family adults without kids?
yes-and strangely we still invite one couple that doesn't have kids
- Did you hold it at a kid-activity place or bring in an entertainer? If so, what kind?
nope
- Was your 2 year old really aware of the party and did they have an opinion on any of this, or was it more about the parents?
nope and DS 1/2 way through opening presents wiggled down and climbed into his crib and refused to come out
- And just out of curiosity, was there a theme? Any great age appropriate non-branded, non-TV them ideas?
sort of-it was a thomas cake but otherwise no theme. Other themes I have done are jungle animals (first b-day-the nursery theme), spring/growing (his 3rd/DD's first) frogs (his 4th/DD's 2nd)



HTH and good luck!

[vonfirmath]

My 2 year old was not really aware it was a party. We held a family party where he got to open presents, spend time with cousins, etc. and it was fine

He really has only become really aware of presents/birthdays SINCE his 3rd birthday party. So I think #4 is going to be a bigger deal

(not sure how I'm going to handle this because our baby is due on his 4th birthday)

He DID enjoy the children's museum at age 2. But I don't think I'd have spent all that money for a party there that year.

[AlbrightRC]

I'll first start by saying that his 1 year old party was just with mommy & daddy at home with cake and presents. Noah had been home for just 2 months so anything else would have been overwhelming. For his 2 year old party we decided to do something bigger and had the party at a bounce place and invited a bunch of our friends that had kids. There was only 1 other 2 year old and the rest were up to age 10 -11 but everyone had a great time. We are coming up on 3 years old and haven't decided what we will do this year.

[SnuggleBuggles]

-Did you invite daycare/preschool/playgroup kids whose parents you are not close to?
No. We had 2 parties. One just family and one kid friend (2 friends- I follow x kids/ age of b-day child)

- Did you invite non-family adults without kids?
Yes, close friends have been included.

- Did you hold it at a kid-activity place or bring in an entertainer? If so, what kind?
I had some activities out (stickers and maybe something else) at the kid party and the kids didn't play with them. They just played with ds2's toys, ate cake and snacks and went home. Happy, fun and easy!

- Was your 2 year old really aware of the party and did they have an opinion on any of this, or was it more about the parents?
They liked their parties but it was really for us.

- And just out of curiosity, was there a theme? Any great age appropriate non-branded, non-TV them ideas?
The friend party was a teddy bear picnic for ds1 and a fish theme for ds1. I usually pick my themes based on the cakes I want to make. I check out Family Fun's website for ideas and then go from there.

Beth

[kms00]

We just celebrated my DD's 2nd bday this weekend. We took our 3 kids to Build a Bear and out to lunch, just our family. My family lives out of state and they were here last weekend for my older daughter's dance recital. We also had my sons 5th bday party that weekend (with his friends at an indoor playground) and celebrated my DD's bday with them too.

[lowrioh]

- Did you invite daycare/preschool/playgroup kids whose parents you are not close to?
We invited my immediate family, some friends with kids, some friends without kids and the neighborhood kids and parents we see regularly.

- Did you invite non-family adults without kids? Close friends without kids and our neighbors.

- Did you hold it at a kid-activity place or bring in an entertainer? If so, what kind?
We borrowed our friends' bounce house (BIG HIT) and had the kiddie pools filled with water (and swim diapers for all)

- Was your 2 year old really aware of the party and did they have an opinion on any of this, or was it more about the parents?
No she had no idea what it was all about

- And just out of curiosity, was there a theme? Any great age appropriate non-branded, non-TV them ideas?
We had an animals theme. I got brightly colored balloons and the Hefty brand Zoopals paper products with the animals at the grocery store. I got some animal shaped crayons from etsy and that was the favors. We also did mini cupcakes rather than regular cake..

DD's birthday is in July so we had it in our yard. If I had to have it indoors it would have been much smaller.

[infocrazy]

Did you invite daycare/preschool/playgroup kids whose parents you are not close to?
No, we didn't until DS1 turned 5 and we just invited 2. We have LOTS of kids in our friend/family network

- Did you invite non-family adults without kids?
Yes, close friends have been included.

- Did you hold it at a kid-activity place or bring in an entertainer? If so, what kind?
All of our parties thus far have been at our house with no official entertainment.

- Was your 2 year old really aware of the party and did they have an opinion on any of this, or was it more about the parents?
DS1 not so much. DS2 knew the party was for his birthday

- And just out of curiosity, was there a theme? Any great age appropriate non-branded, non-TV them ideas?
We have done the following: Balls/Bubbles, Cowboys, Dinosaurs, Monkeys, Airplanes, Lizards, and most recently Butterflies. Not sure what DS2 will want for his birthday. I ask for suggestions, then try and steer to what I have the best ideas for incorporating.

[trales]

Parties age 1 and 2 were adult focused, age 3 was both, and age 4 is going to be kid centered with activities and 10 of her friends, I am not going to invite my friends with different aged kids.

[lmr1101]

Did you invite daycare/preschool/playgroup kids whose parents you are not close to?
We didn't invite the daycare because we would have had to invite about 20 kids total and we already had 8 2 years olds coming who are close friends... However we have been invited to all of the daycare kids parties so now we feel a little akward at some of those parties since they weren't invited to ours.

- Did you invite non-family adults without kids?
No, only adults who were invited w/o kids were a cousin and aunt/uncle.

- Did you hold it at a kid-activity place or bring in an entertainer? If so, what kind?
Ours was at an indoor play play -- it is a local place full of about 10 wooden playhouses all in different themes. Pefect so the kids ran and played for about 2 hours and it didn't end up costing us any more than if we would have done a party at our house!

- Was your 2 year old really aware of the party and did they have an opinion on any of this, or was it more about the parents?
She knew we were going to the "playhouses" and loved that! She didn't understand the reason we were going that specific day was for her party.

And just out of curiosity, was there a theme? Any great age appropriate non-branded, non-TV them ideas?
No theme - goodie bags had a random mix of animal crayons/coloring books and stickers. Plus the location provided all of the papergoods/decorations and they were generic girlie colors.

[GoBlue]

It's funny you should ask this now, DS's 2nd birthday party is next weekend and we had a massive debate about the very same issues here! I hated to just have it at a typical restaurant and force everyone to stay in their seats for 3 hours, but after checking out some playplace type places, we weren't sure that was the best direction to take for our largely 3-and-under set.

We ended up with kind of a middle ground--we are having it at a favorite restaurant of ours, a casual local place, but renting out the upstairs, so the kids can roam around without bothering anyone else, and we're also having a kid craft/activity table, and a balloon artist and face painter come to break things up.

:yeahthat:

DD's 2nd birthday party was Saturday. We had it at a pizza place where we had the entire upstairs for 27 adults, 6 toddlers, 2 school-age kids (1 cousin and 1 sibling of a friend), and a couple of infants. We invited:

Immediate family and my in-town first cousins
4 kids from daycare who DD LOVES (and their parents, who are our friends)
Our next door neighbors (their DD is also one of our DDs best buddies)

I also hired one of the teachers from daycare to come and be with the kids at the "activity table" (coloring Elmo pages, play-doh, make-an-Elmo project), which was GREAT, since all of the 2 year olds know and listen to her, and also great since it allowed the adults some time to actually chat.

In addition to the Elmo-themed activities, I had Elmo table clothes and party hats, and two big Elmo balloons, which were the hit of the party.

DD LOVED it! Loved being with her friends in her party dress. She was very clear that the party was for her. We all had a great time!!!

Good luck!

[AnnieW625]

A few questions on what you do/did for a 2 year old:
- Did you invite daycare/preschool/playgroup kids whose parents you are not close to?
- Did you invite non-family adults without kids?
- Did you hold it at a kid-activity place or bring in an entertainer? If so, what kind?
- Was your 2 year old really aware of the party and did they have an opinion on any of this, or was it more about the parents?
- And just out of curiosity, was there a theme? Any great age appropriate non-branded, non-TV them ideas?

We invited 10 playgroup friends for her second birthday. All of the kids except a few babies at daycare were a good year older than her then so we didn't invite them.

We invited our parents, my grandparents, aunt & uncle, DH' aunt & uncle and cousins (18, and 26 at the time; no kids). I invited the rest of the family to stay for dinner, and cake; we opened presents then.

We held the party at the park.

I think DD1 was somewhat aware of the party. I took her to the store with me and she picked out a cake. It was Sesame Street.

For the party the theme was Hello Kitty, and just invites, plates, and table cloth. We did have one Hello Kitty mylar baloon and the rest were just colored baloons. We just did cupcakes at the park; much easier than doing a whole cake.

[SoloMelody]

- Did you invite daycare/preschool/playgroup kids whose parents you are not close to?
NO

- Did you invite non-family adults without kids?
YES our close friends and godparents

- Did you hold it at a kid-activity place or bring in an entertainer? If so, what kind? No at godfathers house

- Was your 2 year old really aware of the party and did they have an opinion on any of this, or was it more about the parents?
DD knew it was a special day, no idea that it was hers maybe untill she opened presents

- And just out of curiosity, was there a theme? Any great age appropriate non-branded, non-TV them ideas? No theme, just good adult food(which DD eats) and cake.

DD turns 3 next month and we will be having a big one in our back yard/deck. At 3 I will answer yes to all questions above. She knows all about birthdays and is excited to have her own tea party just like Barney. Off to find cute tea cups!