Garbage Truck Birthday Party

Four-year-old birthday parties are the best. Add garbage, and it's even better.

I had lots of ideas for this party, but only a certain amount of effort is reasonable when you're dealing with the chaos of a dozen preschoolers. When it comes to appreciating the decor, or understanding clever games, they really don't care.

Here's the invitation again. I used old magazines and newspaper for part of the backdrop.

These were the party favors -- little Dollar Tree garbage cans with treats inside. The kids were really excited when they walked in and saw something with their name on it right away.

While we waited for everyone to arrive and get settled (or feel comfortable enough in a new place to let go of Mommy's hand), the kids colored pictures of garbage trucks and cans. You can see the decorations in this picture -- plastic bottles hanging from light fixtures, and old newspaper for the tablecloth. The cost was nothing and the clean up was easy. That's how I roll.

I feel dumb that I didn't take more pictures to show you, but you'll just have to imagine. We put a garbage can covered with balloons at the end of the driveway, a bin that said "Dump your shoes here" on the front porch, and a "Dump Station" sign on the bathroom door. I also cut flower shapes out of cereal boxes, taped them to long straws, and stuck them in vases for centerpieces. I've heard of people sticking these in the ground in their actual flower beds as well. If this had been a bigger kid party, I probably would've also put pizza boxes on the wall in place of picture frames and scattered crumpled papers everywhere. 

The first game we played was the legendary Donut Game. I think I played this at every one of my birthday parties growing up, only with powdered donuts because they are messier. We tied mini chocolate donuts to a broom stick and had the kids race to see who could eat theirs first without using hands. To make it go with the theme, we pretended they were garbage truck wheels.

Love this action shot.

It turns out that this age has a really tough time not using hands, so the game ended up more like this.

That's my studly little brother and sister holding up the donuts. As Madsens, they know the Donut Game well and were excellent referees. 

Matt came home from work for the party. He is loved.

Jude tried to get in on all the action. He doesn't understand age differences. He's number-blind.

See him trying to join the hopping follow-the-leader train to the garage?

Again, I don't have good pictures of this game because I was busy running the party. This was basically a Cake Walk, only we were pretending to run a garbage route. The numbers were taped on the garage floor inside little houses, so the kids were supposed to pretend they were picking up that house's garbage with every stop. They didn't quite get it. But they loved choosing a prize when their number was picked, and I was just proud of them for finally figuring out how to walk around in a circle at a steady pace.

If we had more time, or less people, or older kids, I would've done a few more games. I bought those long grabber things from the dollar store so we could scatter trash all over the lawn and let the kids pick it up with their gadget arms. But they ended up being difficult for tiny hands to work, and required a lot of grown-up help, so we skipped it. I also thought of doing an obstacle course involving dust pans, sanitary gloves, and boxes, but I thought that might be too complicated as well. Also a magazine/junk mail frisbee toss might have been fun, or a race sorting trash and recyclables.

Matt and I like to think of ourselves as amateur fancy cake makers, so I had plans to make a big cool fondant garbage truck cake for Josh this year. A few days before the party, however, he told me he wanted a circle cake with a garbage truck on top. That was it. And he was persistent about it. So I ended up doing a box funfetti cake with canned vanilla frosting, and he helped decorate it. We didn't have a small enough toy garbage truck to use as a topper, so I took a garbage truck picture he colored, glued it to a cereal box, cut it out and stuck it on top. It wasn't exactly what either of us had envisioned, but it held the candles, so we're calling it good.

Somehow I forgot that the most exciting part of a birthday party for the kids is watching the presents be opened. They were so interested in seeing what was in all that wrapping paper. It was just a mass of little heads the whole time, with someone at all times yelling "I can't seeeee! Scoot baaaaack!"

If you're wondering whose legs those are in the background, that would be my snuggly brother and dad. You can't tell by their expressions, but they were great chaperons for the party. They love kids.

Okay, so...

If you're in the market for garbage truck party ideas, here's a little summary.

DECOR

- Garbage can with balloons at end of driveway

- Cereal box flowers in vases and in flower beds

- "Dump your shoes here" bin on front porch 

(Never hurts to add the word "dirty" or "stinky")

- "Dump Station" sign on bathroom

- Newspaper tablecloth

- Plastic bottles hanging from lights or ceiling

- Trash or crumpled papers scattered on ground

- Pizza boxes on wall in place of picture frames

GAMES

- Donut Game with garbage truck wheels (chocolate mini donuts)

- Garbage route cake walk

- Obstacle course with dust pans, sanitary gloves, boxes, etc.

- Race sorting trash and recyclables

- Magazine/junk mail frisbee toss

- Trash pick up with extending grabber tools

You'll find more ideas of you Google "trailer trash party". 

We had fun. You will too!