A Green 1st Birthday!

We happily used our Linden Hills Co-op catering gift certificate (thanks EcoParents!) and had fun thinking up ways to green-up the party! Here's the scoop...

• I bought re-usable, bamboo party streamers from the Linden Hills Home Store.
• All other decorations were things that I already owned, such as candles, carriage lights, a re-usable table cloth, potted flowers, etc.
• We had a bonfire in our backyard after the party, and instead of purchasing wood, we burned leftover scrap wood from a house project.
• We purchased the birthday cake from Whole Foods, which does not use artificial flavors, colors or preservatives. They also use all natural ingredients and no hydrogenated oils.
• Invitations were sent via email. This was hard for me, because I wanted a paper invite to put in her scrapbook! So my compromise was to create a photo invite, and just print one for her book. Then the 'real' invitations were electronic, with a picture slide show attached. I thought this was a good compromise. It felt silly to create a 'fake' invite, but she'll never know the difference.
• We purchased whole fruit and cut it up ourselves (melons, etc) instead of buying pre-cut fruit in plastic packaging. We normally do this, but it's especially important when serving large quantities. Plus it's fresh and cheaper!
  
• We had paper bags for recycling next to the trash, and they were clearly labeled. I've put bags out at parties for recycling in the past, but have always been frustrated that people don't use them. Well der...labeling them helped a lot.
  
• The thing I'm most proud of is that we successfully accomplished NO GIFTS! I went to my neighbor's one year old birthday party recently, and the invite had said 'no gifts' but everyone showed up with a gift anyways! I was baffled and concerned that the same thing would happen to me. I didn't want a bunch of (excuse my language) plastic-crap-from-China. So I used a little humor in the invite, and said...

"Now listen up...NO GIFTS. For real, we mean it. If you ignore this and bring something, you're going to make all the other guests feel bad. Seriously. How else can I emphasize this... NO GIFTS NO GIFTS NO GIFTS! Thanks."

People thought this was pretty funny. At the same time, they realized that I was serious. Only one person brought a gift, and she justified it by letting me know that it was from a garage sale. Which I actually thought was a great idea! I think I'll try asking people to bring only hand-me-downs or 2nd hand gifts next year!

Overall, I think we did well. There is always room for improvement, but hey...I've got many more birthdays ahead to practice!