Anatomy of a First Birthday: The Invitation

"When parents of a one-year-old throw a big barbecue, I know it's more for them than for their child. The best child-centered birthday parties are loosely structured and short. They begin with free play, end with food and cake and the blowing out of candles. No matter what the occasion is, though, try to limit the celebration to two hours. I know many parents who hire clowns and entertainers of all sorts for toddler parties, but give me a break. Toddlers don't need entertaining. A mother recently told me about a celebration for a one-year-old at which the child ended up crying and had to leave her own party!" Tracy Hogg, Secrets of the Baby Whisperer for Toddlers, Ballantine Books, 2002. p. 88

The Story:
We have our son's first birthday party in one week, and I've been a little mindblown at how extravagant first birthdays are these days. While researching what I could do, I was looking at threads on babycentral.com and saw one titled "Is $90 too much to spend on a first birthday cake?" I clicked it, positive that all of the responses would be along the lines of, "Are you crazy?! Why would you spend that much on a cake for a first birthday?" Shoot, I don't think I spent that much on my wedding cake. But no, the majority of the responses were, "Oh, not at all, I'm spending $160 on mine...I spent over $200 on the decorations...I'm making all of my decorations by hand, lol, because I'm crafty like that...first birthdays only come once, go big or go home!" I was shocked, quite frankly. Nothing against anyone who wants to or has gone that route for a first birthday. I'm in the student lifestyle mindset where extravagance is outlandish. Besides, a seventh birthday and a tenth birthday and a sixteenth birthday only happen once. Wouldn't it make more sense to save the money and the craziness for birthdays he'll actually remember? I started feeling very rebellious and even more lost about what to do for his birthday. The only options seemed to be break the bank or do nothing. Come on. We couldn't do nothing. I needed to plan something fun and classy, centered around our baby, and as inexpensive as possible.

The Plan:
So I decided that we'd invite a few of our couple-with-baby friends over to hang out for an hour or so. Oh, hmm. Our place is too small for an extra four guests. Luckily we have a pool in our complex and the hellishly (literally) hot weather, so that took care of finding a place with enough space and took care of the entertainment in the same option. Oh, and it's free. :)
Then I was thinking about what to serve for the cake. I didn't want to pump my pure whole foods baby full of HFCS and carnuba wax and sugar. I'll do a post on what I decided to do next week, once I find out how my chosen cake recipe goes over. Then I was thinking about the plates/cups/napkins and didn't know what of the myriad of colors available at the dollar store to choose from. My birthday party research suggested choosing a theme to help with color choice. Of course I immediately went to my two-in-one creative consultant/husband. We had just gotten a huge supply of PJs for the little guy from his grandma, among which were some awesome skull and crossbones PJs that we both loved. So my husband suggested a pirate theme so could wear his awesome shirt. Thus was born the theme for our son's first birthday party.

The Invitation:
I actually got started on the favors for the guests first, but they're not done yet, so I'm starting my coverage with the invitations, which are all done and ready to be delivered tomorrow. I wanted to go inexpensive and awesome, nothing chintzy or cheesy. I decided to do a treasure map-style invitation on "parchment"--or crumpled up, burned brown paper lunch sacks.

The How-To:
First, you have to cut open a lunch sack. I cut down the seam on the back and cut off the bottom of the sack, then I measured and cut out two pieces of 8 1/2x11", the same size as computer paper. A lunch sack is perfect for this, with just a little left over on the edges.
Next, I created the invitation as a Word document. I needed a pirate-y message and a nice swash-buckling font. The familiarize yourself with pirate lingo, I highly recommend this website: http://www.mangolanguages.com/blog/learn-to-speak-pirate/ Once you've completed the course, you'll be able to come up with an authentic, original message for your pirate invitation. :) For my font, I choose Blackadder ITC (which I've also used in years gone by for Harry Potter-type ventures :) )
Here's my message, to help you get your creative juices flowing:

Captain *child's name*--

Ye & yer crew be invited to a celebration in honor of *birthday boy/girl*’s first birthday. Join us fer carousin’ around the pool, feastin’ on birthday delicacies, and enjoyin’ the fine company of yer fellow buccaneers.

When: __________________

Where: __________________

I made up a basic map in Paint of the major streets around us to help people find their way and put a big red X where the pool is. I topped it off with a clipart skull at the top, printed it out on my "parchment" and got this (I've scratched out specific details, but you get the idea):

Next, I ripped off the edges to make it look more parchment-y. The more irregular and asymmetrical, the better. I got a pilot light and set it on fire in a few places (one at a time!) for the classic burned-map look. (Hint: Hold your invitation with the flames going away from the rest of the invitation so the flames don't spread too fast. Do the burning over the kitchen sink so you can drop the invitation in the sink and douse it if it gets out of control, and to catch the ashes that will fall for easy clean-up.) Then I crumpled the invitation up real good to get the worn animal-hide feeling. Here's what I got:

Pretty sweet, huh? The last thing to figure out was how to deliver the invitations, because I couldn't very well just hand people pieces of crumpled brown paper. Sooo, I folded them in thirds (like I was going to put them in a long envelope), then in thirds again. I tied them with a bit of jute that I have in my supplies inventory for my Etsy shop. I marked the upper right hand corner with the first letter of the name of the person the invitation is for so I can keep them straight. I figure random markings add to the mystery of it, lol.

Viola. Authentic, thematic treasure map-style invitations for our pirate themed birthday party for our son.

Here's the exciting bottom line: they're just under $0.02 a piece!

Coming next week: baby and toddler-friendly pirate party favors and baby-friendly birthday cupcakes.

Invitations now available for custom ordering in my Etsy shop: http://www.etsy.com/listing/79056586/pirate-birthday-party-treasure-map