Cookie Monster Birthday Party
- Aubrynn Leystra
- Nov 11, 2024
- 8 min read
Updated: Feb 7
All the details on our daughter's second birthday party so you can throw the ultimate bash for your own little cookie monster!
Our daughter has been such a big fan of Cookie Monster over this past year - basically since she was introduced to the "C is for Cookie" song. I knew it was the perfect theme for her second birthday party!
I'm spilling all the info on what went into this party so you can have inspiration for the little Cookie Monster (or Sesame Street!) lovers in your household!
(Since this is a longer read, I'm including a Table of Contents to help you navigate! You can find links to products and designs at the end of each section.)
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The Theme
Although I wanted this to be a Cookie Monster party, I didn't want the dark blue to feel too heavy and masculine, especially because my daughter is very girly. I decided to bring a lighter, more feminine feel to the party by making the main colors baby blue and cream with gold accents. I then strategically added pops of the darker blue, Cookie Monster images, and chocolate chip cookies to complete the look. I also emphasized kraft paper as a main backdrop as needed to complement the other colors and give the theme a more casual feel.
In addition to colors, I also selected a few fonts to be used for any text on signage, mailings, etc. I wanted these to be easy to read, give a trendy feel and emphasize that this party is for a little girl.
Here are the fonts I used (from Canva):
Pacifico
Amatic SC
Lora
Here are the hex codes for the colors I included on my vision board:
The Mailings
I'm a good old fashioned gal when it comes to mailing paper invites and thank you cards. It just feels so personal and formal, which I appreciate.
For invites, I wanted to keep them simple and light. For this reason, I chose to make the background the plain cream color.
I like to include a QR code and short link to an Amazon wishlist of suggestions for gifts. We never expect guests to bring gifts, because we simply want them to just celebrate a joyful time with us. However, I have received enough questions asking for ideas that I found it can be helpful to those who do want to purchase something. I try to either include a short message such as, "Your presence is presents enough, but if you are looking for gift ideas, feel free to reference this list of suggestions." or place the link in a more inconspicuous place (like the back!) so no one feels pressure to purchase.
(Thank you card info coming soon! They may not have been received by everyone, so I don't want to spoil them just yet!)
For both invitations and thank you cards, I used kraft paper envelopes (5x7). I printed on-theme address labels (Avery Template 5263) and placed gold and cookie envelope seals on the back.
You can find templates to these mailing designs here:
Thank You (coming soon!)
The Decor
This is definitely the part of any party that always takes the most work - both in planning and
in execution!
As mentioned before, I wanted this party to feel like an understated version of Cookie Monster. Rather than it having his face everywhere and the bold blue color taking over, I wanted to use softer colors that felt more feminine while adding small pops of bright blue and Cookie.
To achieve this, I used cream, light blue, gold, and shades of brown for the main focal points (like tablecloths, backdrops, and balloons). I used bright blue for some accent foil table skirts and as part of the picture backdrop to add some dimension. For Cookie Monster accents, I used a one foil balloon by the entry welcome poster and scattered some stickers on the tables for kids to enjoy.
For the rest of each table centerpiece, I had a bunch of balloons and painted pumpkins! Since this was for my October baby, I wanted to incorporate a fall element. I found smaller pumpkins and painted them either bright blue with Cookie Monster eyes or khaki with brown spots to look like chocolate chip cookies.
We hosted this party in our large shed. It was the perfect space, but since we do use it for storage and working, we had a few shelves with items we couldn't move. To hide these, I found table skirts to be a great option.
The other piece of decor I focused on was a feature wall for pictures. We had a large opening to cover (because, again, shed!), so I used large rolls of kraft paper. This worked great to provide a plain landscape. I put together a balloon arch along with a foil accent backdrop, Happy Birthday banner, and bunch of balloons.
You can shop all the decor I used here!
You can find a template to the Welcome Sign here.
The Food
One of the foods our daughter has really enjoyed for pretty much the entire last year is pasta, so I thought a pasta bar would be a great (and cheap and easy!) option for our meal.
I chose to serve only one kind of noodle - penne. Since I knew our guests well, I was confident they would all be happy with that option. I also have loved this noodle for kids - its a great shape to eat and easy to cut if you prefer smaller pieces.
The topping choices included marinara sauce, alfredo sauce, meatballs, and shredded chicken. There was also shaved parmesan to top it off.
For sides, we served garlic bread, buttered french bread, Caesar salad, and salad greens with Italian dressing. We also had a Cookie Monster fruit platter made with blueberries and blackberries (two of my daughter's favorites!). I chose to offer a couple chip options, as well, for kids and any picky eaters.
The fruit platter was so fun and easy to make! I found blue, round plastic serving trays at the Dollar Tree. I drew Cookie's mouth and colored it in with Sharpie both to give me guidelines and to ensure it still looked like Cookie Monster if people ate the berries. For the eyes, I used white ceramic dressing dishes we already owned, filled them with vanilla yogurt, and added a strategically placed blueberry to each dish.
For drinks, we offered personal-sized 8oz milks (both white and chocolate), Honest juice boxes, water, and a Cookie Monster Punch (made with Blue Hawaiian Punch, Pineapple Juice, and lemon-lime soda).
The dessert was my personal favorite part of the day! For a party that isn't super scheduled, I'm personally not a fan of having traditional birthday cake. Instead, we prefer to save cake for smaller family celebrations during the birthday week and opt for an on-theme dessert that's easy to serve and eat.
For this party, we chose chocolate chip cookies (duh) and cake pops! You guys - the local baker we chose knocked my vision for these cake pops out of the park. We had three different kinds - Cookie Monster (Cookies and Creme), Chocolate Chip Cookies (Funfetti), and Cream with Gold Flakes (Salted Caramel). Not only did they look cute, but they were absolutely delicious! These were one of the highlights of my daughter's day, for sure.
Links to Templates for Food-Related Designs:
The Activities
Cookie Decorating
You can't have a Cookie Monster party without a cookie decorating station! The local baker who made our cake pops was also kind enough to make circular, undecorated sugar cookies. They were so good - super soft and the yummiest flavor.
I provided a bunch of frosting colors, icing options, and sprinkles so everyone could have options to make their desired creations. I found these cute eyeball sprinkles that I thought were perfect for the theme! I also provided treat bags so people could take home decorated cookies to enjoy later.
You can find the design template for the Cookie Decorating sign here.
Coloring and Crafts
Always a must if you have young guests! There were also plenty of adults taking turns at this table for some artistic fun.
For coloring pages, I found six different free cookie monster designs online and turned them into coloring pages.
For crafts, there was a cookie jar sheet that could be colored. Then, the cookies could be cut out and glued inside the cookie jar. There was also a cookie sheet shape matching game to make; this was my personal favorite. It was pretty simple to create, super cute, and it can be used over and over for a great inside activity. I know we will be using ours a lot over the winter!
Links to Design Templates for Coloring and Crafts:
You can find the design template for the Crafts and Coloring table sign here.
Cookie Monster Bag Toss
I wanted to offer something for adults if they found themselves sitting there bored (which I don't think happened, thankfully). I transformed our cornhole set into Cookie Monster. I wrapped the boards in bright blue wrapping paper and taped large Cookie Monster eyes onto each. For the bags, I found white and khaki (since there are two different teams). I used a circular shape puncher to punch circles out of black cardstock paper. I then glued the circles onto both sides of each bag to make them look like cookies!
Play Center
Since I knew we would have pretty young kids and babies as guests, I wanted to give them a space to play freely rather than having to be held the entire time. We put down several layers of blankets and brought out some more versatile toys (Mega Bloks, toy cars, an activity table, etc.)
Since we were in a pretty open shed, we also kept our daughter's outdoor riding toys (balance bike, four wheeler, Cozy Coupe) for kids to enjoy.
Opening Gifts
We prefer not to set aside time for our kids to open all gifts in front of everyone during their parties. There are a few reasons for this:
When they are super small and not totally sure what is happening, it may take awhile or not be exciting for them or everyone watching.
When there are a lot of young guests, it can be difficult to see someone getting a ton of cool gifts. We don't want hurt feelings or the pressure to have to open all the toys for everyone to enjoy before the birthday kid even has time to play with them first.
We never expect guests to bring a gift. We don't want someone to feel bad if they don't have a gift for the guest of honor to open.
We don't throw these parties for the gifts. Personally, I love birthdays and reasons to celebrate (if you follow me or have read the about section of this website, you'll know that!). I also love planning events, so kids birthdays are the perfect chance to do that. We love having some of our closest friends and families share in the joy of celebrating with us.
We do tend to have guests who really wanted to see our daughter open the gift they brought. To accommodate this (which we are totally happy to do!), we discretely brought the gift to their table and had her open it with just them. This felt so personal and allowed her to open just a few gifts at a much slower pace. We could also thank them and truly express her excitement for each gift.
The Favors
We offered two main favors (in addition to the smaller things incorporated throughout the party).
The family-friendly favor was a jar of Chocolate Chip Cookie Mix. This was so simple to put together and I loved that people could relive the special day when they made the cookies on a cozy night with their family.
The other favor was for kids and was the painted pumpkins used for the centerpieces. I intentionally painted these with washable tempura paint. While it took a few coats to cover, I wanted the kids to be able to take them home and enjoy them as is or wash off the paint and make their own creations.
Links to Design Templates:
Whew! That was a lot! If you're reading this, thanks for sticking with me! I hope you feel inspired to throw your own Cookie Monster birthday party! And if you feel exhausted just reading the article, then let me plan it for you! Seriously, I'd love to. :) You can fill out the contact form or reach out to me for more info regarding any of your event planning needs!
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