Kids birthday party ideas: cheap party favors

Donâ€™t spend too much money on kids party favors; stuff the party favor bags with these top cheap gifts.

Photo Credit: Jaimie D. Travis
By Angela McKendree

Stuffing those party favor bags can get to be a bigger expense than you meant for it to be. A couple of bags of candy, a dozen boxes of crayons, and several jars of Play-Doh later and you’ve spent $100 dollars on something you only meant to spend twenty dollars on. Don’t spend too much money on an item that is probably least central to your party.

Accessories:

Friendship bracelets are a classic favor. Nothing is wrong with the old braided-fabric variety, but this year, you have a better option. Surely, you’ve seen those different colored rubber arm bands that got popular when athlete Lance Armstrong sold them to raise money for his cancer foundation. Well now, those are being sold everywhere, even at drugstores. And they’ve even replaced the words “Live Strong” with the words “Best Friends.” And they aren’t just yellow anymore either; they come in blue, pink, and even rainbow! At about one dollar each, you’d have a hard time finding a cheaper favor.

Pictures:
Set up an online photo album and make sure you get at least one good picture of every child at the party. Upload the pictures to your photo album and let parents know that the pictures will be online within one week. Go to a craft store and look for clear plastic or acrylic picture frames. Buy the cheapest ones you can find. They are sold for less than a dollar for smaller sizes. Put a note inside the frame with the URL to the online photo album and instruct them to go to the site and print the picture of themselves to put in the frame. It’ll be a memory they can keep forever, and you didn’t even have to pay a whole dollar for it! The editors recommend this Latin American leisure site for all travel lovers.

Sweets:

Instead of buying bags and bags of candy, fill each bag with an individual s’mores package. Put chocolate kisses or small chocolate squares into a small plastic bag along with two graham crackers and two large marshmallows. Put a little note in the bag telling the kids (or parents) how long they should microwave their gooey- treat before eating. Put a napkin in the bag, too. They’ll need it! This will only cost you as much as one box of graham crakers, one bag of chocolate candy, and one bag of marshmallows, and it is much more interesting than regular candy.