Creative Party Blog

This is the second invitation we used for my son’s truck and car birthday party. Using both this design and the dump truck allowed me to be more creative since I was making so many! You’ll see the design for the dump one in another post. To have a unique feature, we attached blinking lights to the front of the garbage and dump trucks for the headlights. You can’t mail the invitations with the lights shown so you’ll need to hand them out or mail in a small box.

Wording for this invitation was as follows:
Cars & Trucks….Trucks & Cars
Harris’ New Road Leads to
A Birthday Playdate
’cause He’s Two!

Destination: Harris’ Home
Date and Time

To make the trucks, use yellow, blue and black heavy scrap booking paper. After cutting the truck out, the window and shadow are glued on. Cut a small hole in the center of the wheels and then in the body of the truck. I used a small hole punch for this. Attach the wheels with small scrap booking brads. If you want to add the light, start with a small hole and make it bigger as needed. Turn on the light right before delivering the invitation.

Resources: Scrap Booking Paper and brads can be found at any craft or hobby store or where scrap booking supplies are sold. Blinking lights are found in the bridal area of Michaels. They come in a pack of two. Garbage Truck Party Invitation Template.

Photo taken by Amy Hall Photography, Portland, OR.

We used this invitation for my son’s truck and car birthday party. I couldn’t decide between the dump truck and the garbage truck so we used both! You’ll see the ideas on that one in another post. To have a unique feature, we attached blinking lights to the front of the trucks for the headlights. If you decide to add the light it pretty much makes the invitation not mailable unless you put it in a small box which could be neat.

Wording for this invitation was as follows:
Cars & Trucks….Trucks & Cars
Harris’ New Road Leads to
A Birthday Playdate
’cause He’s Two!

Destination: Eddie’s Home
Date and Time

To make the trucks, I used heavy scrap book stock paper in yellow, red and black for the wheels. After cutting the truck out, the cab, windows and red line at bottom are all glued on. Cut a small hole in the center of the wheels and then in the body of the truck. Attach the wheels with small scrap booking brads. If you want to add the light, start with a small hole and make it bigger as needed. Turn on the light right before delivering the invitation.

Resources: Scrap Booking Paper can be bought at any craft or hobby store. Brads can be found at scrap booking stores or where scrap booking supplies are sold. Blinking lights are found in the bridal area of Michaels. They come in a pack of two. Dump Truck Party Invitation Template

Photo taken by Amy Hall Photography, Portland, OR.

For a Car Birthday Party, these T-Shirts with car applique designs are perfect. I made these for all the girls that came to my son’s Car and Truck Birthday Party. These did take a bit of time to make. The kids loved them and it was rewarding to me to see them wearing the shirts out at the park or wherever when I had taken so much time with them.

The store where I bought the T-Shirts didn’t have enough of one color for me to get all the sizes and shirts I needed for the party, so I mixed and matched. This made it a little more fun for me as I didn’t have to look at the same color over and over again.

Each shirt has a car body and 2 wheels. The cutting out wasn’t too bad except for the windows. Do not worry about it being perfect. After a few washes the ends will fray and you don’t even be able to tell! You can either do a solid color fabric and if you do this, I would choose a heavier weight fabric. Not quite the weight of denim but right under it. I wanted to do a pattern as I know girls love patterns. It’s best to use a fabric with as tight of a pattern on it as you can find. There are many cute fabrics with bigger patterns on them but the bigger patterns will not show up well once cut out.

To make the shirts, you’ll first cut out all your truck pieces ready to apply to the shirts. It’s best to use a heavier weight fabric close to denim but not that heavy. Use Double Stick Fusible Web to adhere the pieces to the shirt. Follow directions on the webbing or follow these steps. It’s important to pre-wash your fabric as it will shrink and you’d rather it shrink prior to applying the design on your shirt. If you think your shirts are going to shrink as well, it’s probably not a bad idea to buy preshrunk shirts or wash them yourself.

1. Trace your design in reverse on the paper liner on the fusible webbing and remove second liner.
2. Stick webbing to the wrong side of the fabric.
3. Cut fabric and webbing along the traced lines.
4. Peel off the remaining paper liner and place the design on to the shirt. Car body should be done first and then the wheels.
5. Press the pieces down with a hot iron with or without steam. Press the car body first and then the wheels.
If you aren’t a seamstress, you can stop here. But if you don’t sew the pieces down the design won’t last as long. If you do sew, about 1/4″ in from the edges, top stick each piece in place with a contrasting color thread. And actually, you should sew the car body down before applying the wheels. This will make top stitching a lot easier.

To give away, I put each shirt in a favor box will each child’s name on it. This way I also didn’t have to sort through sizes at the party and worry that I had given the wrong size to the wrong child.

Resources: Template for Car Shape. Fusible webbing can be found at any fabric shop. T-Shirts can be found at Target, Babies R Us or any major department store. Pretty much any quality t-shirt will work. Solid heavy weight fabric for the wheels and a fabric with designs on it can be found any any fabric store in your area. You probably won’t be able to find a heavier weight fabric that has any kind of design on it. The fusible webbing will help!

Photo taken by Amy Hall Photography, Portland, OR.

For a Truck or a Dump Truck Birthday Party, these dump truck party favors are super cute. I made these for all the boys that came to my son’s birthday party. I won’t lie to you it took quite a bit of time the way I made them. But it was very rewarding when I would see the kids around wearing the shirts that I had handcrafted! This could easily be done as a garbage truck party favor as well. Use the template for the garbage truck invitation and iron away.

I couldn’t decide on which color scheme I liked best so I made all different color combinations for the boys. Actually, the store where I bought the T-Shirts had a limited number of certain sizes and to get all the shirts I needed, I had to cross colors. So, it all worked out fine.

Each shirt has a truck body and 3 truck wheels. The cutting out wasn’t too bad actually. It doesn’t matter if it’s perfect as the edged will fray with washing. Using a combination of Blue, White, Brown, Grey and Green will work for any boy and can be worn with jeans or khaki pants or even plaid shorts that are so popular right now.

To make the shirts, you’ll first cut out all your truck pieces ready to apply to the shirts. It’s best to use a heavier weight fabric close to denim but not that heavy. Use Double Stick Fusible Web to adhere the pieces to the shirt. Follow directions on the webbing or follow these steps. It’s important to pre-wash your fabric as it will shrink and you’d rather it shrink prior to applying the design on your shirt. If you think your shirts are going to shrink as well, it’s probably not a bad idea to buy preshrunk shirts or wash them yourself.

1. Trace your design in reverse on the paper liner on the fusible webbing and remove second liner.
2. Stick webbing to the wrong side of the fabric.
3. Cut fabric and webbing along the traced lines.
4. Peel off the remaining paper liner and place the design on to the shirt. Truck body should be done first and then the wheels.
5. Press the pieces down with a hot iron with or without steam. Press the truck body first and then the wheels.
If you aren’t a seamstress, you can stop here. But if you don’t sew the pieces down the design won’t last as long. If you do sew, about 1/4″ in from the edges, top stick each piece in place with a contrasting color thread. And actually, you should sew the truck body down before applying the wheels. This will make top stitching a lot easier.

For presentation, I put each shirt in a favor box will each child’s name on it. This way I also didn’t have to sort through sizes at the party and worry that I had given the wrong size to the wrong child.

Resources: Template for Dump Truck, T-Shirts can be found at Target, Babies R Us or any major department store. Pretty much any quality t-shirt will work. Solid heavy weight fabric can be found any any fabric store in your area.

No matter if your child is the birthday boy/girl or an attendee, everyone likes a well packaged gift. Today, the packaging is almost as important as the gift itself. I recently went to a baby shower where the gifts that were wrapped well got many more ooohs and aaahs. But I digress. It simply shows that the giver took the time to think about the presentation of the gift and therefore implies that they though long and hard about the gift that is inside.

These car boxes we made to hold car and truck themed t-shirts that were given as a favor at my son’s Truck and Car Birthday party when he was 2. Rather than making these boxes, I bought pre-made boxes: 6″ X 4 1/2″ X 4 1/2″. To customize them, I glued a sheet of velum the size of the top of the box and then cut out two different car shapes our of scrap booking card stock and glued those on as well. Add some strips of wax paper to wrap the gift in or some tissue paper and nothing could be simpler.

Resources: Car Image Templates, Velum and Scrap Booking Card Stock came from Michaels. Pre-Made box also came from Michaels.


Above photo taken by Amy Hall Photography, Portland, OR

For my son’s second birthday party, we had a truck and car party. He was and is fascinated by cars and trucks! And since we had girls coming, it allowed me to do car things for them and truck themed items for the girls.

These cakes are mini cakes made from one pan form. I took a black disposable table cloth and painted a road on it to be the centerpiece of the table. Then after decorating the cakes, I put them on the road with some figures we had around the house for a little whimsy.

The truck and car cakes are small enough that they are just like cupcakes. Which if you have a child you know that cupcakes rule right now. Each child can easily eat one. I used the cake directions from the pan and they not only turned out well but were even yummy!

Resources: Williams Sonoma Car and Truck Cake Pan made by Nordic Ware. These aren’t available on Williams Sonoma any longer but the pan is very heavy duty and I would not blink twice about purchasing it second hand from someone reselling it online. Pan makes 8 different kinds of cars and trucks.