When my kids turn about 3 years old, they understand all about birthday celebrations and they get very excited about celebrating their own birthday. This year my daughter had all sorts of ideas for her birthday weeks in advance. She made sure I knew she wanted to have a purple princess birthday party with dress up and unicorns. I love hosting parties and I also value keeping kids parties budget-friendly. If you know how to follow a recipe and bake simple treats such as a boxed cake mix and sugar cookies, there’s no reason you can’t throw a fun themed birthday party for your own child!
I baked our yummy party treats the day before and set up a princess birthday party buffet table using decor I already had. We purchased some small extras such as the purple pinwheels and gumballs from Oriental Trading, but I already had the purple tulle, table cloth, and purple-themed decor accents. We dressed up my girls’ American Girl dolls in purple outfits as a fun kid-friendly party decoration. Our purple princess birthday party treats and decor was as easy as can be!
It’s helpful to organize party decor in a storage box to have on hand for kids birthday parties. I often buy decorations after the holidays from the clearance racks and store the festive party decor until I need it.
My daughter’s purple princess dress is from Just Unique Boutique. This purple dress will be well loved and used many times. I love the high quality details and wipeable fabric; I’ve had to spot-clean this party dress several times and it’s held up beautifully. I also washed it in our washing machine once after several weeks of regular use and this gorgeous dress came out no worse for wear. My daughter’s princess dress has capped sleeves, lace-up sides (so it can be resized for growing little girls) and a beautifully gathered skirt and tulle train. The adorable party dress is accented with a rhinestone heart at the waist.
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We invited 12 little girls to my daughter’s 3-year-old princess birthday party. They had so much fun dressing up and playing with homemade sensory cloud dough! Homemade play dough is such an easy kid’s party activity because it is fun for a variety of ages and keeps kids occupied with creative play.
Princess Birthday Party Play Dough Kids Activity
Our DIY sensory cloud dough is made with hair conditioner, cornstarch, food coloring, and glitter!
See our full Homemade Sensory Cloud Dough recipe here »
Princess Birthday Party Treats
No kid’s birthday party is complete without presents and treats! Our homemade party treats included chocolate cupcakes frosted with purple icing and a 3-tiered purple ombre princess birthday cake. I used 2 boxes of cake mix to make our princess birthday party treats.
To make different colors of purple frosting, I just mixed different amounts of purple food coloring into the icing each time I refilled my icing bag. I’ve made homemade icing in the past but this time I used the frosting tubs, which offers easy and consistent results when I am trying to quickly frost cupcakes or decorate a birthday cake.
My daughter loved her purple ombre birthday cake, with periwinkle icing on the bottom, light purple in the middle and pale lavender icing on top. We decorated our Princess Birthday Party cake with lavender chocolate pearls.
Kids parties are so fun to plan and host. You can easily create a memorable kid’s birthday party on a budget with a little planning and creativity. What are your favorite kids party ideas?
Toddler Birthday Cake Smash
Of course, after the party we had to take birthday cake smash photos — which ended up being more like “cake sampling” photos with my meticulous little girl. She had a lot of fun, even if there was no chance of her smashing her face into her cake. Happy 3rd birthday little princess!
Hi, I’m Katie! I live with my husband and 4 kids in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho. I love Jesus, coffee, creative projects, photography, and traveling. I’ve previously worked as a web designer, journalist, and barista. I hope you enjoy our creative projects and family adventures!
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OMG. So gorgeous little princess.Love these ideas.Your daughter is really very lucky to got someone like you.I think your daughter was very happy on her birthday.And thanks for sharing this. Cause in the next my baby’s birthday.I will use these tips on my baby’s birthday.
What a cute party idea for that pretty little princess. That dress is so nice. She is adorable. Happy birthday!
Oh, my goodness, cuteness overload! What fun ideas and I love to see that you can do it on a budget.
I hope she had a wonderful birthday – I know now how I want mine to be! It looks like there are so many beautiful details included in everything, it all looks so gorgeous! Great idea about stocking up on the party and decoration bits while they are on sale/clearance!
I’m all about doing these parties on a budget. The simple act of keeping the color scheme coordinated makes the party look that much richer.