My birthday is in May and while I was growing up, around Christmas time every year I would start planning my birthday party. Just ask my mom. What I enjoyed most was picking a theme and getting all of the details together. Once my first born was about to turn one, I naturally started planning his April birthday party around Christmas time, too!

I knew from the beginning I wanted his party to be Mickey Mouse themed because I’m a big Disney fan. The only TV show he watched before turning one was Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, he was Mickey for his first Halloween, and one of his first words was “Mickey.” We also went to Disneyland on his actual birthday and had the party the Sunday after our trip.

I added ideas to my Pinterest board from other Mickey parties just to get my brain working on it and eventually made the ideas my own from the inspiration of the others. I also looked on Amazon, Target, Walmart, and Party City for Mickey themed decorations and ideas. Most things I found there for Mickey Mouse parties I didn’t love and wanted the theme to be more subtle.

I also didn’t want to spend a bunch of money, so I ended up doing a lot of DIY things and getting most things for the party at the Dollar Tree. In the end, I think I spent about $100 on everything for the party, not including the food. This includes decorations, party favors, and the T-shirt for the birthday boy.

This may seem like a lot for a budget party, but I also used gift cards I earned through Fetch Rewards and Amazon points I used through my Amazon credit card. 

In case you don’t know, Fetch Rewards is a free app where you take pictures of your receipts and earn points. With those points, you can redeem them for gift cards to a ton of stores, including Amazon, Walmart, Target, and so many more! 

If you are interested in trying out Fetch Rewards, you can use my referral code 5DBNYF to earn yourself some extra points. It doesn’t cost you anything, and if you save up enough points, you can earn free gift cards!

I’ll share everything we did for the party in great detail with you now to hopefully spark some inspiration for your next party.

Let’s get into it!

• DIY Mickey Cupcakes

I made these cupcakes completely from scratch, the cake and frosting. I frosted the cupcakes with piping bags and tips I found at the Dollar Tree. I used cupcake liners I already had at home and got the red sprinkles from Walmart. To make the Mickey ears, I used mini Oreos that I found at Walmart. They came in a package with individual bags of them. The gold number 1 toothpick I found at the Dollar Tree.

• DIY Mickey Party Favor Bags

I used a pack of brown lunch bags I found at the Dollar Tree and tied them with red and white ribbon I already had at home. For the Mickey head on the front, I used my mom’s Cricut machine to cut them out, but that can easily be done with just scissors. Finally, I used a silver sharpie I already had at home to write the “thank you” message on the front.

I didn’t want to fill these bags with a bunch of junky toys that would probably break the second the kids started playing with them. I thought of consumable things that wouldn’t clutter people’s homes.

This is what was in the party favor bags:

• Bubbles (Walmart)
• Lollipop (Walmart)
• Mickey Mouse fruit snacks (Amazon)
• Small pack of Crayola crayons (Dollar Tree)
• *DIY Mickey Mouse birthday coloring book*

*I found free printables on Pinterest of Mickey Mouse birthday coloring pages. I downloaded them and sized them down so I could fit eight coloring pages on one printer page, printing on both sides. Then after printing them, I cut them and stapled them together to make a DIY coloring book.*

One more party favor we had were Mickey and Minnie ears I found on Amazon. These were passed out at the beginning of the party so the kids (and adults) could wear them during the party and then take them home after.

• DIY Birthday Banner

On Amazon I found this plain burlap banner and used black paint I already had at home with letter stencils I found at Dollar Tree. For the Mickey stencil, I actually used the cut out paper from the Cricut Mickeys I used for the party favor bags.

For his second birthday, I used this same banner again. I was planning on switching out the Mickeys to something that matched his next party, but I ran out of time and ended up just using the Mickey one. I feel like now I’m going to make it a tradition to use it for all of his parties and make it like a memory of his first birthday party.

• DIY Highchair Decoration

I used the same burlap banner for this, the black paint I already had at home, and the same stencils I used for the other banner. For the ribbon, I actually went to my mom’s house and looked to see what ribbon she had because she’s very crafty and has a big inventory of craft supplies. I found all of this ribbon at her house, but I saw it for cheap at Walmart, too.

I cut all the ribbon into about 18-inch pieces. I used twine I already had at home and tied the ribbon on by folding it in half behind the twine, so there was a loop at the top and both ends at the bottom. Then, I put the ends through the loop and tightened it. I repeated this until there was enough ribbon on the twine to go around the highchair tray.

I used the highchair he used at home for all of his meals and just carried it over to the park where we had the party at, which was right by our home. 

• First Birthday Guest Book

This is something I found on Pinterest to do for a first birthday, which I loved. We had this “Happy Birthday to You!” Dr. Seuss book out at the party with a sign saying to sign the book. I plan on giving it to him for his 18th birthday as a time capsule from his first birthday. I found the sign on Pinterest as a free printable, put it in a frame I already had at home, and used pens I already had at home.

I found the Dr. Suess birthday book on Amazon. There were some Mickey birthday books I considered, but we love reading Dr. Suess in our house so it felt fitting. I also have a plan for the kids when they are going through school to have their teachers every year to sign the Dr. Suess book “Oh, the Places You’ll Go!” and give to the kids at their graduation. So, having both of these books be Dr. Suess books felt right.

• DIY Monthly/Holiday Photo Banner

At most first birthday parties, you will probably see photos of the child from every month to see how much they’ve grown and changed in just a year! This is something I definitely wanted at my baby’s party. Over the first year of my baby’s life, I took the same photo of my baby every month on the same day. I laid him on a Pottery Barn Kids Mickey quilt I got as a baby shower gift with his name embroidered on it and a felt board stating how old he was. I also put a Mickey stuffed animal next to him to show how much he has grown.

I used these photos to put on the banner. Since we had our party at the park, I made them double-sided so no matter which side you were standing on, you could see the photos; compared to if it was on a wall and only needed one side. I taped the photos to those same Mickey’s I cut out using my mom’s Cricut machine and labeled each photo in silver Sharpie with a number depending on what month the photo was taken. Then, I used a hole punch and hung them on twine I already had at home. 

As well as the monthly photos, I also took photos of my baby at each holiday with a cute outfit (that my mom probably bought for him) and the felt board stating it was his first Valentine’s Day or whatever holiday it was. I decided to hang these up at the party as well since they were such cute photos. I hung them up the same way as the monthly photos using the silver Sharpie to write which holiday it was.

I didn’t get any photos of these actually hanging up at the party, but I loved how they looked and showed how much my baby had grown and changed over the year.

• Balloons

To wrap it up for the decorations, we had balloons I got from the Dollar Tree in black, white, and red. I didn’t end up using all of these and saved them. I actually used them for his second birthday, which had a similar color scheme. We filled some of these up with helium and put them around in mini balloon bouquets using red balloon weights from the Dollar Tree and red and white ribbon I already had at home. We used these as the center pieces on the tables. We covered all of the tables in black plastic table cloths from the Dollar Tree.

I also found some solid black Mickey shaped balloons that I found at Walmart that I do not recommend. We tried to use helium for them and couldn’t get them filled up enough to actually look like Mickey without them popping. 

We also used the balloons to make the balloon arch that we put behind the highchair. Our friend’s daughter did this for us because I’ve seen her do balloon arches in the past and liked them.

• Birthday Boy’s attire

We got our birthday boy a shirt off of Etsy that said ONE with the O as a Mickey shape. It wasn’t too expensive and he wore it on his birthday at Disneyland, for his party, and just as a shirt until he grew out of it. Then I saved it away with some other things from his party for the memories.

When we were at Disneyland, we got him the classic Mickey hat with his name embroidered on the back, which he wore for his party. Other than that, we wore jeans he already had and shoes he already had.

• Invitations/Thank Yous

For the invitation, we used a design I found on Etsy. There are so many designs you can find on there to match any party! Once I finished the design, I decided to have them printed and mailed out, which is an extra expense, but I love to send and receive things in the mail. This is something that I may have to cut out for future parties, but it is something I want to keep for now. If you don’t want to print and mail the invitations, you can send the invitation through texts, which is what a lot of people are doing nowadays.

For the thank you cards, I found something on Pinterest to do for kids who can’t write yet. I’m not sure if I did it for my son’s first birthday, but I did it for his second birthday and wanted to share it here. I had him pick out a paint color and I painted his hand and then he put a handprint on every card. Once they dried I wrote the thank you message and sent them off in the mail.

• Activities

We had his party at a park near our house mostly for the space and our house not being big enough to host the party. However, this also gave the kids a playground to play on during the party. We also brought chalk for the kids to play with that I found on clearance at Walmart. 

We were given a bubble machine as a gift that we had going during the party and we also played music from our portable speaker we already had. If you have Apple Music, I highly recommend the station “Family Pop” which we have on in our home all of the time! We also brought lawn games we already had at home such as cornhole, giant Jenga, and Spikeball.

• Food

We served hamburgers and hot dogs, which I chose because of Mickey’s famous “Hot Dog!” song. My husband cooked the whole party, which he said he will never do again! He was standing over a hot grill the whole time and people had to come to him for him to socialize. For our son’s second birthday we got Costco pizza instead, much easier!

We had typical party snacks; chips and dips, vegetables, fruit, sodas, etc. I found some Mickey Goldfish during my shopping trips that I put out, too. I also bought those mini 8 oz water bottles from Costco for the party because for parties in the past we got the full size bottles and found them everywhere like half drinken.

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I think that just about does it for our minimal Mickey Mouse themed first birthday party on a budget. There was a lot of stuff I DIY’d and so there was a lot of hands-on work, but like I mentioned before I love planning parties and working on all the details!

I hope you found something in here that you can implement into your own Mickey Mouse themed party. Don’t be afraid to try something just to see if it works and if not, you can always tweak it to make it work for you. 

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With love,

Victoria O’Brien