A More Sustainable Birthday Party?

My little man turned 3 yesterday. I can't believe it has been that long since I gave birth to him. Obviously, he has changed immensely during this time, but I also feel like it has gone by in the blink of an eye. Before I know it, he will be moving out!
Finn had a big rocket ship themed party yesterday and man, planning a kid's birthday party is a little bit like planning a wedding... figuring out the decorations, cake, snacks, gift bags takes a lot of work, even for a simple party and then I spend most of the party running around instead of talking to the guests. But, the party was a success. No major injuries,  nothing broke, and everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves (as much as you can with 15 kids running around). Plus, the weather was spectacular, allowing us to extend our 800 square foot house onto our back porch.
So back to the planning part..... I always feel a bit guilty having big parties because I feel like so much gets wasted or used once and tossed. And since I teach about sustainability for a living, I decided I wanted to try and make Finn's party more sustainable than your typical toddler gathering. I wasn't striving for perfection, but at least an improvement. And it was hard! So many choices, none of which are completely sustainable, and having to choose between the lesser of 2 evils. For example, plates. We definitely did not have enough plates for the 30-plus people who came over yesterday, so I knew I needed to purchase more. But should I go with paper, which would just get tossed after one use but at least were made from trees and not oil, or go with the plastic alternative? I finally decided on sturdy plastic plates and washed them and will use them again at our next party. I know those plates were made from non-renewable fossil fuels, but they didnt go into the landfill and we won't have to use any new materials next time we have a party. But was this the best choice? I can reason with myself, but I still don't really know....

 I found some rocket-themed cookie cutters and made sugar cookies. Boy, these sure did come in handy to cover up some of my decorating disasters on the cake!

 They're from a recipe my grandmother used to make. I debated not putting on the sprinkles because of the food coloring, but I figured a birthday only comes once a year, and decided to splurge.

For party attire, I took an old plain tee that Finn was about to outgrow, and some scrap felt, and using my handy-dandy cookie cutter made a quick felt applique tee. Nothing special, but definitely fit the theme!

I wanted to give out goody bags to the guests, but didn't want to buy plastic bags. So, I took a trip to the fabric store for some affordable space-themed cotton and whipped up some easy bags. It only cost about $4 to make 15 bags, so price wasn't an issue. The bags did take about 30 minutes or so to make all 15, but hopefully instead of being a one-time use, the guests will fins ways to reuse their bags (or re-gift them!) and nothing will be wasted.

 I wanted to also fill the bags with more sustainable choices so I made some recycled crayons from used crayons I found at SCRAP, Portland's goodwill for art supplies. I also made some home-made playdough, but then ended up having to wrap it in plastic so it wouldnt dry out. So even though I wasn't purchasing anything packaged in plastic, I was still essentially packaging it myself. And lastly a few space stickers. Not really sustainable, but I had to throw in something cute!

 For decorations I made Finn a birthday banner out of felt, ribbon and fabric. I figured that I can switch the 3 flags out in future years and have a reusable birthday banner!

 Hanging up....

 Finn and I also made cutouts for the holiday tree (thanks again to those handy multi-purpose cookie cutters!). This picture is terrible quality, but it ended up looking pretty cute.

 I also used construction paper and made some rocket ship cutouts to decorate the walls. I am guessing they will be up until I bust out the holiday decorations!

 The cake. It was hard to make, but at least its over with. I hated to use so much food coloring, and thought about trying to figure out a natural alternative, but in the end, the mom-side won and I wanted Finn to have an awesome looking cake. I'm not exactly sure that's what I made, but at least it resembled a rocket ship.

And here is Finn on the big day next to the rocket ship he painted for the party (ok, I helped him with the tail pipes and the number 3).

Birthday party done, now I can move on towards preparing for the holidays! If anyone has any comments on things they do to throw a more sustainable party, I would love to hear them!