My little Ava just turned the big 1 and I am still in shock! I started planning her birthday party months early (I couldn't help it she's my first baby y'all!) and I knew immediately what the theme of her party was going to be: Despicable Me. We play her the movie on the tablet during car trips and she is mesmerized by the funny minions. Then during a recent trip to Houston we took her to see Despicable Me 2 and she sat in her stroller and quietly enjoyed the movie. Baby of the Year!
Ava was decked out in a custom made minion dress, necklace, and bow and Ashton and I even had matching shirts! Of course, the pups were there too in their color coded bandanas!
My parents drove up from Florida and all of Ava's friends attended. We had the whole she-bang for our little minion including Despicable Me balloons, toys, serving wear, posters, and cupcakes. I made paper lantern minions and purple evil minion goodie bags filled with Despicable Me surprises! We had mostly young kids, Ava's age attend so instead of party games we played the Despicable Me dvd and had a "Box of Shame" photo op. I served a festive menu including themed food from the movie such as Cheese Puff "caterpillars" in a dog food bowl, banana taffy candy (minions love them!), and Robot Coconuttie Snickerdoodle Cookies.
Check out pictures from the party along with the menu below.
I have also included the recipe for the Coconuttie Snickerdoodle Cookies I made and links for all the printables and items I used for the party.
These Minion Quesadillas are a blast to make! Check them out here.
Check out Ava's Minion Munchies Mix here.
My little Minion: the birthday girl Ava!
I ordered Ava's custom printable invites on Ebay. I searched all over for the perfect invite and the ones I found from seller
mrblonde1999 were the cutest and best priced.
I made a sign to display with Ava's monthly pictures
(including 2 minions for her coming soon 11 and 12 month pics)
Family pic!
I ordered the
custom iron on transfers for our shirts on Etsy from
LangePrinting
I found Despicable Me duck tape at Walmart and cover a foam board with strips of it.
Then I taped the top half of her invite to the board and voila I had a door sign for the party!
I framed a minion poster I found at Toys R Us and made that the gift area.
I found fun Mylar Despicable Me balloons on Ebay and "Ava" balloons at Party City and then had them blown up at a local party store the day of the party.
Minion paper lanterns were so fun to make! I used yellow paper lanterns from Hobby Lobby and white and black card stock cut into shapes and attached with hot glue.
For the rest of the decor I simply stuck with the blue and yellow minion colors for the banner, tablecloths, and streamers.
Haha!
The Box of Shame was taken from a clip in the movie featuring the three girls (see pic above) and we just had to create our own and make it a photo op for the kids (and silly adults like me!).
It doesn't get more simple: Just use a large cardboard box, cut a lookout section, and label it.
I handed Minion goggles out to all the kids. I used the pic above that I found with I Googled "printable minion glasses" and printed them out and my wonderful husband cut them all out for me!
Lots of goodies for the party goers! Besides the minion goggles, I also gave out minion party blowers (found at Party City.com) and "Squid Launchers" (like Vector used in the movie) aka mini water guns.
Then I created
purple evil minion goodie bags. You can draw the face on but I Googled "Evil Minion" and just printed out a face and taped it on a purple paper sack (Hobby Lobby) and added purple tissue paper as the crazy hair. I filled the bags with
Despicable Me Party Packs (coloring pages and crayons) found for 99 cents each at Walmart and a bottle of bubbles (great gifts for any age child!).
The MENU
- Stuffed Crust Pizza (I ordered 3 larges which was plenty but I asked Pizza Hut to cut them into squares instead of slices. This gave me more pieces and they were the perfect size for the little ones).
- Veggie Platter with a RANCH Fountain (my genius hubby came up with using our chocolate fountain for ranch dip! It was a hit!)
- Minion Yellow Cake Push Pops
- Minion Chocolate Marshmallow Cupcakes
- Coconutties (Snickerdoodles kicked up a notch!)
- "Caterpillar" Cheese Puffs (make sure to serve in a dog bowl like Gru)
- Banana Candy (the minions love bananas!)
- Blue Fizz Punch (Blue Hawaiian Puch with Ginger Ale)
- Pink Minionade
The Ranch Fountain was a hit and the kids were excited
to eat their veggies and dip them in the fountain!
*The blow up minion was a Walmart free gift with Despicable Me DVD purchase.
You can also find them on ebay.
I always have bottled water available but I served two fun kid friendly drinks:
Blue Fizz Punch (Blue Hawaii Punch and Gingerale) and Pink Lemonade cleverly titled Pink Minionade.
For both cupcakes and push pops I used boxed cake mix. One yellow cake and one chocolate with marshmallow filling. I used yellow Cupcake Icing by Betty Crocker and chocolate sprinkles on top for hair.
I found this FREE printable for
Minion Pushpop Wrappers on Pinterest. You can download them
here.
*Despicable Me plates and cups were from partycity.com and the stuffed minion toy was from Party City.
I found these adorable
minion cupcake wrappers (she also sells purple evil minions) on Etsy for only $4 and I printed them myself on cardstock. You can find them here:
FoxTailPaperCraft
I found banana taffy candy and banana runts at a candy shop.
I Googled "Minion Bananas" to find the pic.
Can't forget little Agnus' Caterpillars aka Cheese Puffs served in a dog food bowl just like Gru does for the girls in the movie!
Snickerdoodle Coconuttie Cookies
(My techie husband inserted wires and who knows what into one display cookie to make it a robot like Gru uses to break into Vector's fortress)
Ingredients:
Cookies
- 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
- 1 1/3 cup granulated sugar
- 1 egg
- 2 teaspoons vanilla
- 1/2 cup crushed pecans
- 1/3 cup shredded coconut
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons cream of tartar*
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 2 and 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
Topping
- 1/3 cup sugar
- 1 tbs cinnamon
Directions:
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
- Using a mixer, cream butter and sugar, then add egg and vanilla.
- Mix in pecans, coconut, flour, baking soda, and cream of tartar.
- Form into balls and roll in topping
mixture.
- Drop by teaspoonful onto a greased or parchment lined cookie
sheet.
- Bake for 10 minutes until golden.
Cream of tartar imparts a unique tangy flavor to the cookie, which makes it a classic snickerdoodle.
These cookies should be baked only until
the edges begin to brown – about 10 minutes.
This will keep
the interior of the cookie soft and chewy.
Minions everywhere!
Ava's friend Lily-Grace wore a minion outfit her Mama made out of overalls and a tutu!
Ava's outfit was absolutely perfect for her party and I was so pleased with the
custom made minion dress from
Mckenzie__skye on Instragram. I also ordered the
minion bubble necklace from
Bellasbowtique2008 and the
minion bow from
Bowszigzag both on Etsy.
Ava with my parents, her Papa and Oba.
Charlie and Dylan joined the fun and celebrated their little sister's bday in style with bandanas to match the party colors!
Ava's best friend Charlotte is matching attire! These girls are too cute together!
Molly and me with our babes, Charlotte and Ava.
Craftie Molly even made a minion gift bag for Ava's gift!
Wow! What a party! So glad out friends and family could celebrate Ava's special day with us.
Hope you enjoyed the tips and recipes. If you order anything from the links provided please let the seller know you heard about them from
www.4theloveoffoodblog.com
Check out Ava's Minion Easter Eggs How To here
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