Throwing a birthday party can easily get really expensive.  I made sure that I tried my hardest to stretch every dollar I spent because we had between 30-50 people at Raiden’s first birthday and we needed to provide appetizers, dinner, and cake for all of these people.  Even with us making a majority of it the money just kept flying out the window.  That is why I decided to not buy the expensive music themed birthday party decorations and instead made them myself at home.

They were a huge hit and everyone was asking me how I made them so I thought I would share with you how I made the various different birthday party decorations for Raiden’s first birthday party.

DIY Music Themed Birthday Party Decorations

DIY Record Platter

Supplies Needed:

• Record
• Candle Holder
• Hot Glue Gun and Glue

* Supplies listed are for one Record Platter; if you want to make multiple platters you will want to get more records and candle holders.

Step 1:

If you don’t have these items in your home I recommend going to your local thrift store and/or dollar store to find the items.  I found “candle holders” from Dollar Tree that worked perfectly.  They were the ones that hold the candle on the bottom and your put the scent oils on the top.  I loved that they had a bigger surface area so that the record had more stability.  Once you have them home you will want to wash them so that they are clean before you begin crafting.

*I didn’t take the paper off of the center of the record, but I believe that you will have better results if you do this.

Step 2:

Get your hot glue gun ready.  You will need to be fast so I recommend you have someone help you with this step.  You are going to put glue along the rim of the candle holder and place the record centered on it so that it is glued in place.  You can use a different glue if you want, but this worked real well and was real fast to do.  Now, I had the paper still on the records and noticed that they can easily come apart if they are jostled too much because the glue is adhering to the paper not the record.  I plan to attempt to redo them without the paper, but have not had the chance.  They did hold up through the entire party.

Step 3:

Clean the record with a soapy cloth or wipe so that it is extra clean when you place food atop them.  You wouldn’t want to put food on something dirty.

DIY Music Snack Bowls

Supplies Needed:

• Snack Cups (Bought at Dollar Tree for $1)
• Permanent Marker(s)

Step 1:

I went to the Dollar store and bought their snack cups in the party section.  They came in packs of 8.  I was able to find black and red cups, but our stores were out of white ones.  You will want to pick out whatever colors go with the color scheme of your party and you will want to buy permanent markers as well.  I needed silver and black markers for the red and black cups.  I was able to get these at the Dollar Tree as well, but I know that not all stores have the same products so you may need to buy them elsewhere.

Step 2:

Set aside some time because this is time consuming.  In order to make these DIY music snack bowls you will need to be patient while you had draw music notes onto your cups.  You can choose to draw big or small notes.  We drew half big notes and half small notes to change it up a little bit.  I sat and watched a movie while I drew on the music notes.  It really helped to make it feel like it wasn’t taking as long as it really was taking.

DIY Snack Boxes

Supplies Needed:

• Snack Boxes (I bought boxes like these from a local shop)
• Marker
• Construction paper
• Straight Edge
• Glue Stick

There aren’t really steps for this craft.  Once you have your boxes you will want to cut out half dollar sized circles for each box.  You will need two circles per box.  Once the circles are cut out you will want to glue them onto the box.  When you glue them you can put one slightly higher than the other so it looks like they are different notes or you can keep them level.  That is up to you.  Once they are glued on you will then use a straight edge to draw the lines of the music note.  It really isn’t very hard or all that time consuming.  We only did a note on the front of the box, but you can do it on multiple sides if you so chose.

DIY Microphone Cupcakes

Supplies Needed:

• Cupcake Pan
• Tin Cake Pan (rectangular)
• Cake Mix (we did yellow cake)
• Ice cream cones (if you can find them the colored ones are awesome)
• White Frosting
• Silver Sprinkles

*I found this cupcake pan made for making cupcakes in ice cream cones after the party, but if you think you will make them more than once you might want to invest in this pan.

Step 1:

Make the cupcake batter as directed on the box and set aside.  If you did not buy the pan I found on Amazon then you will need to get crafty.  I cut out circles for the cones out of the tin cake pan and placed it upside down on the cookie sheet and places the cones in the holes.  Once you have them set up you will portion out the batter.  You will want to fill them like you do a regular cupcake pan.  Only fill them around half way because if you over fill them they will make a huge mess and not turn out how you want.

Step 2:

Let the cupcakes cool before you begin frosting them.  You will want to spread the frosting on nice and evenly.  If you are really good you can pipe the frosting on to make them look rounder like a microphone.  (My hands are too shaky and weak that I struggle with piping bags.)  Once you have put the frosting on you will want to use your silver sprinkles.  You can use any kind.  We used a fine sprinkle and a little silver food dye spray on each cupcake and everyone seemed to love how they looked.

And there you have it! Once all of these birthday party decorations were made I felt like I good take a sigh of relief and know that everyone would be able to tell the theme of the party.  In addition to the birthday party decorations listed above we did also make bowls out of records, but that is a post for later. (My hubby wants to write all about it because he is so proud of his bowls.)

If you are looking for more ideas for a music themed party then you should check out my post on a DIY Music Themed Birthday Banner and DIY Music Themed Highchair Banner for a first birthday party.

If you have any ideas on other music themed party decorations please let me know because I would love to try them as well!