Birthdays are always a big day, none so more so than your baby’s first birthday – a great excuse to have family and friends around to celebrate how much your baby has grown and developed during their first year. And each year after that, a birthday is a special day in everyone’s life – in fact, some would say we never get too old for birthday celebrations!
For young children, however, the birthday is really all about the ‘party’! For the first few years a small cake and a candle or 2 will do the trick, with Granny and Grandad there to sing a few bars of ‘Happy Birthday to You’ – but as they reach 3 and 4 they will soon expect to have all of their classmates from montessori around and will be won over by the pile of presents waiting to be opened long after all the guests have left!
So keep it simple for as long as you can, but when it becomes a full on party occasion, it’s still a good idea to keep the party food as healthy and nutritious as you can – nobody wants a bunch of toddlers with a full on sugar-rush running around the kitchen.
Keep these tips in mind when preparing your toddler party:
- Fruit and Veg can provide lots of colour: To make your table appetising, try to choose lots of fruit and veg (carrot and cucumber sticks) and arrange them in an enticing way. Create a rainbow of foods with strawberries, oranges, sliced banana, green grapes, blueberries and what about a few mini marshmallows at each end for the fluffy clouds! Hard to resist.
- Something savoury: Keep it traditional and provide a selection of mini sandwiches for your toddler guests. As it’s a special occasion, why not spend a little more time and cut them into star, heart or flower shapes with cookie cutters. Use a wholemeal bread and a selection of simple fillings to suit everyone. Make some wraps and cut them into slices to create little wheels – again they are easy to eat and look great.
- Traditional Favourites: Remember back to parties when you were young? What springs to my mind is jelly and ice-cream – and it’s still as popular with my own children today. Save up some clear plastic yogurt cartons in the weeks before the party and use them to make little individual, well diluted fruit jellies for the party. You could drop some chopped up fruit or berries into the jellies before they set. Serve with a mini scoop of vanilla ice cream on top – delicious!
- Healthier buns: make some mini fairy cakes or buns and add some nutritional value with grated carrot (mini carrot cakes), grated sweet apple or mini banana bread buns. These are always a great hit – with Mums and Dads too!
- Birthday Cake: Every party needs a cake so make your favourite and enjoy – after all, it’s a birthday so share a little slice with family and friends.
