When my son was turning 6 he wanted a StarWars Lego party. We invited 20 kids and I had given myself a firm budget of $99 for everything.
Invitations : $0
First we emailed invitations. Because I'm a graphic designer I had the tools to create something just for him but Evite has some really cute options. Consider using StarWars phrasing such as : IN A GALAXY FAR, FAR AWAY, A FUTURE JEDI WAS BORN - HIS NAME WAS (first name) SKYWALKER. You have been chosen to join the party to celebrate his 6th birthday.WILL THE FORCE BE WITH YOU? RSVP. All new jedis report to command at 1pm, etc. The point is to spend your time choosing an image and modifying the information instead of licking envelopes or spending a fortune on stamps. Click and it's done!
Decorations: $7
In past years I've always done birthdays big. Like petting-zoo big. So I didn't want this party to feel skimpy. You'd be surprised how far streamers can go. I got black, grey and blue streamers for .50/each at PartyCity with a coupon and put them EVERYWHERE. They were covering every doorway vertically like 1970s beads. We have a stairwell overpass and they hung down over that. Every lamp. Everywhere. I also bought 2 jumbo packages of balloons ($2/each) and blew them up manually. So it seemed like the entire floor was covered in white or grey balloons. My son drew some StarWars pictures to add to the decoration and it also kept him busy while I baked :)
Activities:
At 6 years old they needed a few stations and diversions to keep the party moving.
BALLOONS: $0
The balloons served that role initially without me even planning it. Evidently battling each other with balloons is huge fun for boys. This easily took about 20 minutes of the first part of the party waiting for everyone to arrive and they were all sweaty and exahusted by then. I've done a floor full of balloons at every party since then.
BALLOON PUZZLE: $0
After everyone had arrived and the balloon fun had been exhausted, I told them there were puzzle pieces inside of some of the balloons that had clues we needed to find. They had to sit and squeeze and pop all of the balloons that had a puzzle piece in it and then work together to figure it out. The puzzle pieces were rolled up paper with one word on them each. They loved popping the balloons in different ways and quickly realized they could look through the white ones to see if it contained a note inside. The note told them to go outside where the next activity was waiting.
LEGO FORT: $0-$10
Because this was a Lego Star Wars party, we built a lego fort. We had recently moved and had access to a lot of empty boxes which I taped back up and spray painted all different colors - every color of spraypaint I already had. If you don't have boxes, check CraigsList in your city - people who have just moved give their boxes away for free just to get rid of them. It's where we got ours in the first place! If you don't have spray paint you can use regular paint or cover them with construction paper. I glued them together in different ways to create a fort large enough to where they had to crawl in but 3-4 kids could be inside at any given moment.
WATER GUNS: $1/KID = $20
I filled up buckets and big bowls of water and placed them around the yard and back porch. Each kid was given a water gun and they had a war in the back yard running and hiding in the fort and around trees. A few were really damp but it was a nice day and they dried quickly - it's just water!
DARTH VADER PINATA= $15 + Candy $15
We purchased a Darth Vader head pinata at PartyCity and spent a big part of the budget on candy. We used our plastic light sabre to let each child take a swing. If you don't have one, a big stick painted blue with a black handle will do or just call it a sabre and they will be happy. I used brown paper lunch bags with each child's name already written on it in Sharpie for them to hold and put their collected candy inside.
GIVEAWAYS: $11
Each child kept their brown paper bag (1.99 for the whole box of bags) and candy from the pinata as well as their personal water gun. They also received a candy light saber (recipe below, about .50/saber) to take with them.
Food:
YODA PUNCH: $9
We made Yoda Punch for everyone. It's one container of lime sherbert and one 3 liter of Ginger Ale in equal parts. I ended up making 2 batches of it because everyone was so thirsty! Total with plastic cups : $4 sherbert, $2 Gingerale, $2 cups
CAKE: $8
I made this StarWars cake using yellow cake mix and chocolate frosting. We happened to already have the mold and the chocolate to create little chocolate lego men and the octagons. I free-handed the StarWars logo. The topper is an actual lego creation my son already had.
PRETZLES, CHIPS, GRAPES: $10
I got paper plates and snack foods that I could put out for any who were hungry. The party was from 1:30-3:30 so I didn't feel required to serve a whole buffet which helped the budget significantly. I did put out paper plates and napkins and people just grazed as they wanted to.
That's it! Everyone had a great time, it didn't involve a lot of pre-work or after clean-up (except all the balloons) and our total was $95!
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