I scream, you scream, we all scream for an ice cream themed birthday party with do-able decor you can pull off at the last minute!

Bless her heart, Juniper’s second birthday fell during the week we moved, which meant we hastily split a single cupcake among the three of us, sang “Happy Birthday,” and called it a day.

But we put a date on the calendar to give our little lady a proper birthday celebration with family three weeks later. And we had such a sweet time, I decided to snap some pictures so I could share some of my favorite party details from Juniper’s Ice Cream Themed Birthday Party with you all.

Here’s the inside scoop. {Wink.}

Theme

For some folk, a party theme might turn them into a stress-ball. But for me, it’s a fun way to hone in my focus and also spark some creativity.

Last year, I took inspiration from a felt flower crown to plan Juniper’s Blooming First Birthday Bash.

This year, I decided to explore some of Juniper’s obsessions for theme inspiration: Elmo, Minnie Mouse, Frozen…but then, a new idea struck. What if we went with a shared family obsession instead? That way, it could be a party to suit everyone’s tastes!

Juniper comes from a long line of ice cream lovers. Her grandpa-my dad-is a true fanatic. And with our Orlando temperatures hitting the nineties everyday, nothing sounded quite as refreshing as sitting poolside with a bowl of frozen goodness to enjoy.

An ice cream themed birthday party it would be!

Invitations

I love me a Paperless Post invite. All the ease of a digital invite with the thrill that comes from getting real mail with your name on an envelope that opens to reveal a card.

I included on the card one of my favorite photos of Juniper from earlier this year, relishing in a lick of ice cream. See that sparkle in her eyes? Girl’s got good taste.

We kept our invite list to family just to keep things simple. Also, we wanted an opportunity to have everyone over to our new home, too, so it doubled as a house-warming of sorts.

DIY Ice Cream Themed Decor

I’m the sort of person who would much rather invest time into decorating than cooking…and so a few weeks before the party, I started collecting ideas from Instagram and Pinterest-our modern-day magazines!-for ice cream themed birthday party decor.

I chose just a few DIY projects that seemed inexpensive and do-able to me, purchased supplies the week before the party, and was able to put everything together within less than 24 hours of the party. Phew!

Any other party planners out there work best under pressure? If so, you can totally pull this off! Here’s how I did it.

Ice Cream Balloon Backdrop

Since we’d be spending most of our time on the back patio by the pool, I decided to add some instant party atmosphere with a fun balloon backdrop at the food table.

My inspiration came from the talented @BackdropsByAnna on Instagram who created this beautiful backdrop for an ice cream themed birthday party for another two-year-old:

Here’s a quick run-down of the supplies I used and steps I followed to re-create my own!

SUPPLIES

For your convenience I’ve included *affiliate links below.

• 2 large white plastic tablecloths: dollar store or grocery store
• small handful of clear push-pins
• scissors
• clear heavy duty shipping tape
• butcher paper, kraft paper, or IKEA GIVANDE wrapping paper with the waffle cone pattern
• three colors of balloons: here’s the pack of 60 pastel peach, pink, and mint balloons I bought on Amazon
• optional: 2 red balloons or pieces of construction paper

STEP BY STEP TUTORIAL

1. Hang your tablecloths. I am no stranger to using plastic tablecloths when creating party backdrops (the original & last year’s braided party backdrop featured them prominently). You can’t beat the price, how lightweight they are, and their transformative powers.

I decided to cover a pair of french doors on our back patio with two overlapping white plastic tablecloths to provide a blank canvas on which to adhere the balloons. Also, it would make for minimal damage to our new home, only leaving behind a few pin-size holes on the top and sides of the door frame where I secured the tablecloths with clear push-pins.

2. Cut out and secure your cones. I was at IKEA picking up some items for the new house, when I came across this brown wrapping paper with criss-crosses reminiscent of waffle cone pattern. I snatched it right up to use for party decor. But brown butcher paper or kraft paper would work just fine!

Here’s the full length of wrapping paper spread across our floor, which was plenty for our party decor needs:

I cut out two cone shapes based on my inspiration image and secured them to the tablecloths using a few rolled pieces of clear heavy duty shipping tape. I didn’t need a measuring stick for any of this because I could use the french doors themselves as a guide.

3. Blow up your balloons and layer them row by row. I blew up the balloons not to full capacity, but a little smaller so I could fit more side-by-side. And I used one piece of clear shipping tape to secure the knot to the plastic tablecloth.

This was the most time-consuming part because it took a lot of re-arranging to get it to look right.

And a word of warning: if you get some of the clear shipping tape on the round part of the balloon, don’t try to remove it. Just leave it be. Otherwise, it’ll very likely pop on you. It happened to me at least 5 times before I learned my lesson.

Once I got my row of balloons positioned where I wanted them, I carefully added another piece of clear shipping tape to other side of the knot to help secure it even more.

And then I moved on to the next row! Here’s a peek from the side:

The red balloons to achieve the look of the “cherry on top” was an afterthought, and I happened to have two red balloons on hand. But I love how they completed the look of the two ice cream cones for our two-year-old.

Amazon got me with that, “Customers also purchased…” category after adding the tri-colored balloons to my cart. And I decided to purchase the matching “Happy Birthday” banner, which I strung across the front of the table. It’ll be a great piece to re-use in future years.

The backdrop proved to be the biggest time investment of the projects I took on. It took me a couple hours since I was also wrangling a toddler at the time; however, after seeing how it turned out, it was worth every sweaty minute. Also, it stayed up for two days after the party because we’re slow at clean-up. So, I can say it definitely holds up to humidity.

“I Scream, You Scream” Letter Board Quote

I finally succumbed to the felt letter board trend, and debuted our sign when sharing our moving announcement on Instagram this May.

And so I decided to slap a new quote on it in honor of Juniper’s birthday, saying,

I scream, you scream, we all scream for Juniper’s second birthday!

I could not resist the opportunity to snap a few photos of the birthday girl with the letter board before the party started.

Here are a few inspirational images that were runner-ups for our letter board quote:

• Treat Yo Self
• Juniper’s Ice Cream Bar: 1. Scoop 2. Sprinkle 3. Enjoy
• A party without ice cream is just a meeting.

{Snicker snicker.} So many gems! It was hard to choose. Hopefully by sharing the runner-ups here, some of you can make good use of them now, too.

Here’s a link to the letter board we have, which is only $15 on Amazon, and is a fantastic 12″ x 12″ size. I even bought two more to give as hospitality gifts. Here’s a link to the plastic bead organizer case I bought for only $3.26 for keeping all our letters, punctuation, and emojis organized. Anyone curious for me to write a blog post on how I use it? Let me know in the comments because I’m itching to share!

Okay, here’s another sweet shot of our little mama. She can turn anything into a “baby.” Even an ice cream cone shooter.

Ice Cream Cone Lawn Decor

Since we had the back of the house covered in terms of party decor, I wanted guests to know immediately upon arrival that they were in for a treat! And when I happened this brilliant tutorial for Ice Cream Cone Lawn Decor by Chica & Jo, I had to whip up some of my own.

Ready to see how easy it is?

SUPPLIES

• bamboo skewers
• scissors
• double-sided tape or scrapbook EZ runner tape
• clear heavy duty shipping tape
• butcher paper, kraft paper, or IKEA GIVANDE wrapping paper with the waffle cone pattern
• balloons: here’s the pack of 60 pastel peach, pink, and mint balloons I bought on Amazon
• optional: spray adhesive
• optional: candy sprinkles

STEP BY STEP TUTORIAL

1. Cut out and create your cones. I used that same IKEA wrapping paper from the backdrop project to create a quarter-pie shape that could be rolled into a large ice cream cone. You’ll want them to be at least a few inches shorter in height than your skewers. I forgot to measure, but by happy accident, they were the perfect size for my skewers at 12″ on the sides. I used one as a template to cut out 9 cones.

And then, I ran my scrapbook EZ runner tape up along one of the sides, created my cone shape, and secured the two sides together. I tried to leave a small hole at the bottom of the cone for the skewer to poke through.

2. Blow up your balloons and attach them to the skewers. Next, you’ll blow up your balloons to a size that feels right for your cone and then attach the knot to the flat end of the skewer using clear shipping tape, so the pointy side is facing down. It doesn’t need to look pretty because this part won’t be seen. It just needs to be secure.

3. Poke the skewer through the bottom of your cone and into the ground. Here’s where the magic happens! When you’re ready to put out your ice cream cone lawn decor, you’ll poke the skewer through that hole in the bottom of your cone and right into the ground where you want it displayed.

4. Optional: coat the tops of your balloons with spray adhesive and then add sprinkles. Not gonna lie, this was the step that made me decide I just had to try this DIY. I couldn’t get over how cute the cones looked with actual sprinkles stuck to the top.

Though I still can’t find the boxes with our batteries or Mark’s watch, I somehow managed to find my old bottle of Elmer’s spray adhesive.

And then borrowed the sprinkles from the dessert table to top ’em off with some colorful dots. They almost look good enough to eat!

I lined our front driveway and walkway with the 9 ice cream cones, leading folk to our new front door. I was grateful the rain stayed away, and the skewers stayed put in the ground for the entire party. Yahoo!

Okay, tell me these aren’t the cutest things you’ve seen in a while?

I die.

Definitely check out Chica & Jo’s blog post with the original tutorial and lots of fun activity ideas for ice cream themed birthday parties!

Dinner Menu

For drinks, I whipped up some sweet tea and pink lemonade. And by whipped up, I mean that my father-in-law mixed up the Crystal Lite for us! (Thanks, Dad.)

When folk arrived, we had a few light snacks out to stave off hunger pangs but not spoil appetites

• chips & salsa
• veggies & dip
• hummus

And then about an hour into the party, Mark grilled us some burgers and dogs with the aid of his right-hand man, our nephew Jeremiah.

You can’t have a BBQ without watermelon and pasta salad, amirght? So we added those to the mix along with some more snacks:

• Caprese Pasta Salad: here’s the easy recipe!
• watermelon
• chips
• popcorn
• peanut-butter filled pretzels

Like I said, I’m not a big cook, but an easy-to-assemble side like the Caprese Pasta Salad is just my type! And it was a hit with the guests.

After some fun in the sun, we all had pretty big appetites!

Ice Cream Sundae Station

And now, the moment you’ve all been waiting for…the ice cream sundae station!

I picked up two tubs of ice cream at the grocery store: Neapolitan and cookies & cream. And then had way too much pulling together the toppings and displaying them in the tiniest of dishes with the tiniest of spoons (thanks to my mother-in-law!).

Here’s what was on the docket:

• Gummy Bears
• Sour Patch Kids
• coconut
• blueberries
• strawberries
• cherries
• sprinkles
• Reese’s Pieces
• M & Ms
• chocolate SHELL
• chocolate syrup
• caramel
• whipped cream
• more sprinkles

Once the kids saw me come outside with this tray of goodness, they had flocked to the table like moths to the flame! Can you blame them?

I dished up a small bowl for the birthday gal, and we all sang to her.

She even mustered up the courage to blow out her two candles despite being a bit flustered by the flames.

And then, we all dug in! Nom nom nom.

Favors

After having seconds of sundaes, and taking some time to pray a house blessing, it was time to hug and bid each other adieu.

Each of the cousins got to take home an ice cream shooter as a party favor.

Children of the 80s and 90s, do you remember these throwback toys? I loved them as a kid, and even though they always broke after a few days, they were loads of fun while they lasted.

I found a set of 12 ice cream shooters on Amazon for a little over a dollar each. Worth it! Especially when I saw all the parents’ eyes light up with nostalgia and heard reports of how they kept the kids entertained for the car rides home.

Even little Junie had lots of fun hitting that trigger and seeing the ice cream ball shoot!

To Close

I hope this journey back in time to Juniper’s Ice Cream Themed Birthday Party sparked some inspiration for you…and mainly, that it served as a reminder that party preparation doesn’t have to be super complicated or expensive or time-consuming to be fun.

If you’re like me and it does your soul good to dive into craft projects, follow that lead! If you like to express your creativity through baking or cooking, you go, girl! Or maybe you like to love on others through activities and games…rock on!

Let’s use Pinterest and Instagram as sources of inspiration…and not to feel bad about ourselves if our parties don’t look like the images we swoon over. Because then we’ve lost the plot, haven’t we?

Let’s do what we love to celebrate those we love. That’s the best gift we can give them!

Thanks again for stopping by the party, and before you go, don’t forget to take an ice cream shooter! {Wink.}

Where to next?

If you’re looking for other party ideas, here are some of my most popular posts to spark inspiration:

Click HERE or the image below to join us for a royally fun time at Juniper’s Princesses & Knights 5th Golden Birthday Pool Party.

Next, click HERE or the image below to journey over to Juniper’s “Madeline in Paris” Themed 4th Birthday Party, inspired by the classic Madeline children’s books!

For Pepper’s 3rd birthday, we had a magical “Mickey & Minnie Mouse” party. Click HERE or the image below for all the mouse-spiration.

For Pepper’s 2nd birthday, we had a Puppy Paw-ty that was dog-gone fun. Check out the paw-ty details by clicking HERE or the image below.

And for a floral-tastic time, join us for Juniper’s Blooming 1st Birthday Bash by clicking HERE or the image below.

For Pepper’s 1st birthday, we hosted a “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” party for Pepper. Click HERE or the image below to check it out.

For a story-themed celebration, check out our “Anne of Green Gables” Inspired Birthday Party by clicking HERE or the image below.

And last, but not least, for those of you with a Silhouette-machine interested in creating your own DIY Photo Booth props using my free cut-file, well, this one’s for you.

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