In August my husband and I had a baby shower for baby K. And I’m sharing all the details below on how you can throw a DIY party similar for under $500.
1. Venue/Location: We chose to do it at our house for 2 reasons.
A. Save the cost of renting a function hall
B. We have a big enough yard
Now since this was a summer shower we were able to do it outside in our backyard and fit everyone comfortably. I don’t know what renting a function hall costs in your area, but for us it can be a minimum of $500 dollars. So right off the bat we saved that costs. We already had 2 tents, so we set them up for shade and in case of rain, which thankfully it did not rain and it wasn’t sweltering either. Now if you have a large enough space in your home and aren’t inviting too many people you can still do it at your house during the colder months. We invited about 70 people and I think ended up with about 45/50. Below is a picture of the space under the tents and links for the tents we have if you’re looking to purchase one.
This is the link for the big white one in the back of the picture.
This is the link for the grey one in the front of the picture. This one is much easier to put up and take down.
2. Invitations: I purchased our invites on Etsy for $10 dollars and did a digital file. Now a days you don’t need to mail invites to people for certain events anymore. Go all digital and save yourself some money. Plus people are always on their phones. There were cheaper invites than the $10 one I selected but I loved the invite so much I went for it. A picture of the invite is below and the link.
3. Favors: This doesn’t have to be something expensive. I had searched online for something fairly inexpensive but couldn’t find anything I liked. I think favors have to be practical otherwise you end up with a lot left behind and or no one uses them. So we decided to give a Haitian alcoholic drink which is similar to an Irish Cream, it’s called Kremas. My mother made it, so she purchased all the ingredients for it. My only expense related to this was purchasing the jars for them, which I got on amazon, 60 jars for $40. Below is a picture and link. The jars came with the little tags and I picked up a purple sharpie from Michael’s for $2 and wrote Thank You on it. The only negative thing about these jars, they didn’t send enough tags. I was able to find one similar at Michael’s and purchased it for $2.50 because I used a 20% off coupon.
4. Decor & Centerpieces: Since this was an outdoor party, I kept the decor to a minimum. I purchased a similar design of elephant on Etsy with letters to make a banner and made 2. One saying Little Peanut and the other saying Baby Massé. I hung these on the side of my deck and the fence so they could be seen from anywhere. Link below. 👇🏾Inside the tents I hung up lanterns and fans which I had purchased from Party City. The lanterns and fans were hung up inside the tent so when sitting and looking up it was above your head. Those 2 packages cost $10. Below are some pictures.
For centerpieces I went to dollar tree and picked up some fake flowers. I only needed 6 because I set up 6 tables for 60 people. So one jar per table. I used Mason Jars I already had and white sand and stone I already had and placed them in the jar. I picked out white and purple flowers, 2 white flowers for each jar and 1 purple flower for each jar. My total cost on centerpieces was $20. It was simple, cute and didn’t cost much. Below is a picture of what the centerpieces looked like.
The last thing we had for decor was a photo back drop. I was determined to take pictures at my shower. So many times I throw parties or go to parties and don’t take any photos. This time I ordered a cute backdrop that went with the color scheme and snapped a photo with everyone before they left. Photo and link below. It was only $18 on Amazon.
5. Dinnerware: I had plates left over from a party years before that I had not used and the colors were white and silver, which fit my color scheme. I ordered a few more packages of these plates online. Link is below. These plates are very durable and if need be can be washed and used again. Definitely not necessary to buy plates online for any party, but since I wanted to use the ones I already had I went back to the same site and ordered an additional 4 packages for $30.00
For silverware I purchased a box of purple forks, knives and forks from party city that had 70 of each. This one box was enough for guests to eat the main course food and the cake. This box only cost $10.00
For drinks I purchased paper cups for the kids the same color as the silverware also from party city. For the adults, I used my milk jars that I purchased years ago and brake out every summer for a party or two. I dressed up the jar by putting the elephant from the invite on the front and ordered paper straws from amazon. Photos and links below.
Link for the bottles ☝🏾
Link for the paper straws ☝🏾100 paper straws for only $7.99 on amazon!
6. Food: My family cooked a lot of the food and I did not spend much on any food for the shower. All I purchased was corn on the cob and I got them when they were on sale at Stop & Shop 10 for $2.00. I purchased about $6.00 worth of corn. I also purchased 2 watermelons for about $5 each. We had rice, ribs, macaroni salad, chicken, turkey and ham sandwiches and watermelon. The food was more than enough and perfect for an outdoor summer shower.
7. Dessert: I love a nicely decorated cake. So I went to my usual cake girl and had her create the cake you see in the pics below along with sugar cookies. The Rice Krispie treats I purchased as a big box of 40 and put 20 in cellophane bags.
8. Games: I created my own games online rather than purchasing any. I went to a word search puzzle engine on google and out in the words that I wanted. I also created my own baby shower scramble so no money was spent on this. We also played a guessing game. Guess how many cups of peanuts are in the jar. I did peanuts since our invite was an elephant and it said a little peanut is on its way. The last game we played was for all the guest to guess what baby k’s name is. No one guessed it right but it was fun to listen to all the names they came up with. I’ll reveal her name at a later time.
I hope this helps you plan and organize an inexpensive party for your next event 😘