Sorting through the dozens of 1st birthday party theme ideas and planning your baby’s first birthday can feel overwhelming. All the love and joy you’ve experienced in your child’s first year of life can lead you to feel pressured into perfection. But the reality is, you don’t need a Pinterest perfect party to celebrate the memories from the past year or look forward to the year to come. In fact, a DIY party is often even more special and personalized to your child!
I have DIYed every single one of my three kiddos birthdays and I’m convinced it only makes the day more special. But since I’ve been through this whole thing a few times, I’ll give you my best tips and tricks to build a simple, affordable budget-friendly first birthday.
This post is all about outlining themes, decor, food, and fun for budget-friendly and easy diy 1st birthday theme ideas.
This post contains affiliate links.
Budget-Friendly 1st Birthday Party Theme Ideas
How to Choose a 1st Birthday Theme
- Think about your babies favorites
- Do they have a favorite stuffed animal or toy that is a certain animal or theme? Do they have a favorite song they listened to over and over as a baby? Do they love watching cars out the window?
- Focus on memories rather than picking the “cutest” theme
- Determine if indoor vs outdoor changes your theme
- Consider strolling through the Dollar store to see what they have to offer. Sometimes they have tons of themed decorations. You’ll just never know what theme until you check.
1. Farm Themed
Fun Phrases for Signs/Invitations
- Holy Cow, I’m One!
- E-I-E-I- ONE
- Old McDonald had a party
- Party Til The Cows Come Home
Easy DIY Decorations
- Balloon garland with added cow spots on white balloons and/or a cute pig face and curly tail on pink balloon
- Stuffed Animals- Surely your kids’ have a few pigs, cows, chickens, and goats in their giant stuffed animal stash. Setting these around your party makes for the easiest decor ever and it’s free.
- Create pig nose cups with pink cups from the dollar store with two sharpie ovals on the bottom
Simple Food Ideas
- Use rice krispies as hay bales and add a tractor nearby for added decor
- Dirt dessert with worms or a pig of pink marshmallows on top
- Baa Baa Q Sliders- Pulled pork goes perfectly with the farm theme and is easy to throw in a crockpot to stay warm for guests.
- Label any sort of chip or snack mix as chicken feed
Photos
A one year old in a cow onesie makes the cutest picture ever even without a cute backdrop.
Budget Tip
Consider a toy barn as one of your child’s first birthday gifts. This way, you can use it as decor at their party!
2. First Bee Day
Fun Phrases for Signs/Invitations
- Come and Buzz By
- Sweet to Bee One
- Have You Heard the Buzz? _____ is One!
Easy DIY Decorations
- Use popsicle sticks to create a honeycomb on the walls or tables
- Create a bee hive in a corner of the room with yellow cups
- Cut white, orange, and yellow posterboard from the dollar store into hexagon and put them all over the walls. Draw a few bees on some of them to make it look more like a honeycomb.
- Draw sharpie lines on yellow easter eggs and glue on eyes and pipe cleaner wings for adorable bees. You can even fill them with candy and have a bee scavenger hunt at your party too!
- Decorate with fake sunflowers from the dollar store
Simple Food Ideas
- Deviled eggs with black olive pieces as stripes
- Add a few drops of yellow food coloring to melted white chocolate, dip strawberries in it, and drizzle them with regular chocolate for delicious bees
- Create bee kabobs alternating dark red grapes and pineapple
Cake
- Instead of a cake, make a hive of donuts and add on these adorable sugar bees. It’s simple, adorable, and delicious.
Photos
- Some simple yellow and orange balloons alongside the posterboard honeycomb wall discussed earlier makes a super cute backdrop for photos
Budget Tip
Consider purchasing this Honeybee Tree Game to use as a centerpiece for people to play at the party. We bought this game for my daughter First Bee Day and my kids love playing this game all the time now!
3. My First Rodeo
Fun Phrases for Signs/Invitations
- Welcome to My First Rodeo
- Saddle Up, I’m One!
Easy DIY Decorations
- If you have a rocking horse, be sure to set it out as an adorable decoration or photo opportunity
- Use cut up bandana tied to string to create a garland for anywhere you need a little extra decor at your party
- Buy or use a cowboy book that you have as a guestbook for all your guests to sign
- Search your child’s stuffed animals for cows, horses, etc. to help decorate
- Paper clip photos onto a pallet (you can often get pallets for free from companies)
Simple Food Ideas
- Rice Krispies as Hay Bails
- Hot dogs, sliders, mac n cheese, baked beans are all cheap and easy options that fit within the rodeo theme
Cake
- A horseshoe shaped cake is very easy to DIY and perfect for a rodeo birthday
- A cow print smash cake is adorable and easy to diy with a few cookie crumbs
Photos
- If you can get your hands on one or two small hay bales, combine these with a few cow and horse stuffed animals for an adorable picture
- Don’t forget to throw your kiddo in a cute pair of cowboy boots if you have them
Budget Tip
Try to thrift items to use as your decor. Things like baskets, crates, bandanas, plaid blankets, boots, and anything denim all can be turned into great decor for this theme.
4. Berry First Birthday
Fun Phrases for Signs/Invitations
- Berry First Birthday
- Berry Sweet One
- Berry Loved
- It’s Berry Fun to Be One
Easy DIY Decorations
- Picnic blankets work great as easy decor, especially as a table cloth
- Choose red and pink fake flowers from Dollar Tree to decorate anything and everything
- Grab a few strawberry balloons to put up around your party
- Cut our free printables of strawberries for the easiest decor ever
Simple Food Ideas
- Fresh fruit displays and charcuterie boards fit the theme well and are easy to throw together
- Consider doing a waffle or pancake brunch with all sorts of different berry syrups for an inexpensive themed meal
- Berry lemonade or berry infused water is great for drinks
- Fill this “1” charcuterie board with fruit
Cake
- Make a simple strawberry shortcake with whipped cream and strawberries. It’s cheap and super easy to make yourself.
- Create a cake in the shape of a 1, put some frosting on it, and cover it with all sorts of berries
Photos
Berry baskets or crates alongside a picnic blanket makes for an adorable photo opportunity. You can also turn red balloons into strawberries and tie on uninflated green balloons for leaves.
Budget Tip
Save jelly jars leading up to the day of the party, clean them, and use them as vases on party day
5. One for the Books
Fun Phrases for Signs/Invitations
- Chapter One
- One for the Books
- Once Upon a Time, _____ Turned One
Easy DIY Decorations
- Thrift a few baskets and fill them with books to place around the party
- Place out any stuffed animals that are book characters
- Put out colorable bookmarks for people to decorate
- Put out a book such as, “Happy Birthday to You”, for guests to sign
Simple Food Ideas
- Go the route of tea party style snacks and do simple mini sandwiches, fruit, cheese/crackers, etc.
- Choose sides/mains that each go along with a book in your kiddo’s collection and set the book next to the food
- Ex. fruit salad for “The Very Hungry Caterpillar”, cookies for “Give a Mouse a Cookie”, pink cake pops with “The Lorax”, etc.
Cake
- Bake a rectangle cake and decorate it like an open book and use frosting to write out “chapter 1”
Photos
- Create a backdrop using books you already have. You can prop them up open somewhere, use pages from old books your kids don’t read anymore, or hang books on the walls with command strips.
- Grab a few cute pairs of prop glasses for pictures
Budget Tip
If you need more books for your party, check with your local library. They will often have used books that you can buy cheap. Or if you want to use book covers for some of your decor, you can always find cheap used books at thrift stores. If you intend to use the covers, it doesn’t matter if there is coloring all through the book.
6. First Trip Around the Sun
Fun Phrases for Signs/Invitations
- Love You To The Moon and Back
- Let’s Celebrate ________’s First Trip Around the Sun
Easy DIY Decorations
- Make a rocket ship out of cardboard or a large posterboard and cut out circles as windows for the kids to look through and take pictures in
- Use crumpled gray paper as moon rocks
- Use black streamers all over the ceiling in combination with white Christmas lights for a magical space ceiling. You can even add some of these hanging planets.
Simple Food Ideas
- Make rocket ship fruit kabobs with a strawberry as the point at the top and cut cantaloupe as fire at the bottom
- Have stick pretzels and marshmallows and a print out of different constellations for people to build
- Cheese board with cheese cut into stars
- Make plato cookies that look like Earth
- Use a star cookie cutter to cut watermelon into stars
Cake
- Easily create a moon smash cake using this dome cake pan, white frosting, and a simple water bottle lid (or something similar) to put craters in it
- Create a rocket ship cake like this with a regular circle cake pan
Photos
Grab this adorable astronaut onesie for the cutest photo op ever.
Budget Tip
Black table cloths from Dollar Tree can go a long way with this theme! Add in some glow in the dark stars for some easy decor that your kids can put in their room after the party!
7. O-Fish-ally One
Fun Phrases for Signs/Invitations
- Come in for a Reel Fun Time!
- ______ is Officially One!
- Reeling in a Big ONE!
Easy DIY Decorations
- Display gummy “bait” or goldfish in a tackle box
- Add bobbers into your drink dispensers
- Add fish net on the tables on top of plain colored table cloths
- Set up a kiddie pool with a magnetic fishing set (you can add water, ball pit balls, or nothing but the toys)
- Twisted green streamers up the wall to look like seaweed
- Clip photos onto a propped up fishing net
- Hang bobbers from their high chair (make sure they are big enough and not reachable to be a choking hazard)
Simple Food Ideas
- Make a bait bar with gummies (frogs, eggs, worms, fish, etc.)
- Dirt dessert with worms
- Pretzel rods as the fishing rods
- Rainbow goldfish as rainbow trout served with a small fish net (obviously a new one ;))
Cake
- Frost any size/shape cake with blue frosting and then add whatever you like. You can add a dock with rod pretzels, a few gummy fish, or some seaweed with green frosting.
- OR…opt for these adorable fishing pole cupcakes with just pretzels, swedish fish, & frosting
Photos
Create the perfect photo backdrop with a blue tablecloth hung on the wall, green streamer seaweeds twisted up the wall, a few fish cut outs, and a few lantern bobbers hanging above.
Budget Tip
Check Dollar Tree before heading anywhere else for the gummies, goldfish, streamers, and tablecloths. Dollar Tree is often the best for candy and simple party supplies so this theme has some amazing dollar store opportunity!
This post was all about helping you sort through the many 1st birthday party theme ideas out there and find one that’s just right for both your baby and your budget. I hope you found one you love. And don’t forget to take a moment and look at these 17 Birthday Traditions to start this year.
-Beautifully Busy Mom
Meet the Author
Hi, I’m Monica! I’m a former teacher turned stay at home mom of three! I started this blog after feeling very lonely at the beginning of my motherhood journey. My goal is that no other moms would feel the way that I felt. So, this blog is filled with free resources, fun activities, and answers to the not so easy questions. That way, you can enjoy the beautiful chaos that is motherhood. Let’s be friends 🙂
