Lilo & Stitch Luau Party

I always wanted to try throwing a child's birthday party. It's a chance to have an extremely fun theme, be creative with the foods, and design a show-stopping display.

It started with the theme: Lilo and Stitch luau. What's great about this theme is that luau decorations can be found everywhere, including cost-saving stores such as The Dollar Tree, Christmas Tree Shops, and Michaels (with lots of coupons). For the Stitch items, Five Below carries a ton of Lilo and Stitch items, including mini figurines.

For the decorations, Love, Rose started with a custom digital illustration of Stitch. This was used for the invitations and gift tags. The base of that illustration evolved into emojis placed on the food tags. Additional labels for the food were custom vinyl transfers onto metal pineapples. The big focal point was the balloon arch and backdrop, assembled by Love, Rose. To embellish the arch, additional pieces were bought from the Dollar Tree.

When it came time to coordinating the food, the goal was to have something customizable, tropical, and slightly referential to Hawaiian cuisine. The result was build your own poké bowls and smoothie bowls. Guests were welcome to grab bowls of varying sizes and fill it with whatever ingredients they wanted. Finding a poké bowl caterer in NJ is a tricky task because they are mainly in South Jersey. However, a nearby sushi place catered, and they were able to provide the individual ingredients in separate containers. The fish was fresh—not frozen—making the bowls ten times more delicious. Smoothie mixes and fruit are super refreshing. It's a nice alternative to raw fish, especially since some of the guests were pregnant. Most of the individual ingredients could also double as baby or toddler food. No more bad or wasteful leftovers!

The grandma of the baby was put in charge of the desserts. To embrace the theme, shell cookies and chocolates were placed onto a large spread. The sheet cake had a pineapple base, with figurines creating a beach scene. Fun fact: the furniture pieces were from vintage Polly Pocket sets! If you have older toy items that could potentially go with the theme, add them in and avoid buying pieces that may only be of a one-time use.

Few takeaways from having a kid's party:

1. Have food options where items can be mixed and matched for the picky eaters. They can also be used for babies. Afterwards, they make great multi-purpose leftovers.

2. Make the party your own with custom designs carried through multiple decorations.

3. Source your items from multiple stores to get the best deals and meticulously curate the decorations for your theme.

Catering: Playa Bowls and Ryujin Sushi

Decorations and Coordination: Love, Rose

Decor sources: Amazon, Christmas Tree Shops, Dollar Tree, Target, and ShopDisney

Desserts: Grandma of the baby

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