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Our family loves all things Dr. Seuss! With our recent trip to see Seussical the Musical at the Orlando Rep and Dr. Seuss Land at Universal Islands of Adventure, it took me back to when my little Thing One and Thing Two were celebrating their very first birthday with a Dr. Seuss themed party.
When other children’s birthday themes fade away due to a lack of popularity, Dr. Seuss is a classic theme that will always stand the test of time. Today I would like to share ideas for a Seusstastic birthday party.
Since this birthday party was for one-year-olds we didn’t have a lot of children attend, it was mostly our adult friends and family celebrating this amazing milestone with us. We survived our first year with twins! Haha! So there were no games, our focus was food and fun!
As guests arrived we asked them to stop and pick up a fun hat as well as sign Eden and Xen’s “Happy Birthday to You!” books. This is a cherished keepsake and a fun birthday book that we still often break out on their birthday to read. Since they are twins and I wanted them each to have their own copy I purchased two off of Amazon, my go-to shopping place!
Throughout the house, we had a variety of Dr. Seuss books. Many of the books I borrowed from the public library. While searching for Dr. Seuss books I discovered some titles that I had never heard of including “The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins” and “The Butter Battle Book”. These made for great conversation pieces for the adults.
Speaking of books, many of the ideas for menu items came from this wonderful little book I bought on Amazon, Green Eggs and Ham Cookbook. You can purchase it used for a few dollars from a site like Amazon. The great thing about this cookbook is that not only did I get to use it for Eden and Xen’s very first birthday party menu, years later we are still getting enjoyment from it. It is a great cookbook to break out when cooking with your little chefs!
We did our own take on many of the items, playing on beloved Dr. Seuss titles and passages. I went the extra mile and made little cards with the name of the food item and another card that included the passage from the book.
Here are some of our menu items:
Since this was an afternoon party, we opted for a twist on the classic Green Eggs and Ham. My mom makes the best deviled eggs and with a little green food coloring and some prosciutto, we had our perfect dish!
We transformed pita pocket sandwiches stuffed with various deli meats, lettuce and tomato into the classic Dr. Seuss book, Wocket in My Pocket.
Our Poodle Noodles pasta salad made for a more obscure Dr. Seuss reference that came straight out of Fox in Socks.
“When beetles fight these battles in a bottle with their paddles and the bottle’s on a poodle and the poodle’s eating noodles…
…they call this a muddle puddle tweetle poodle beetle noodle bottle paddle battle.” – From “Fox in Socks”
Now I wish I could’ve made this next delectable dish, but I am not that talented when it comes to sushi rolling. So for our Fresh Fish, I ordered a giant sushi platter from our local sushi restaurant.
“Do you like fresh fish?
It’s just fine at Finney’s Diner.
Finney also has some fresher fish that’s fresher and much finer.”
– From “Oh Say Can You Say?“
These Biggle Balls, a reference from Dr. Seuss’s Sleep Book, are bite-size cheese balls. There is a recipe in the Green Eggs and Ham Cookbook, but if you have a cheeseball recipe that you enjoy like I do, you could also just make bite size balls for this menu item. You could also make meatballs as Biggle Balls, really anything ball shaped would do for this reference.
Of course, no party would be complete without a Pink Yink Ink Drink. Our Pink Yink Ink drink was simply pink lemonade.
“This one, I think, is called a Yink. He likes to wink, he likes to drink. He likes to drink, and drink, and drink.
The thing he likes to drink is ink.
The ink he likes to drink is pink.
He likes to wink and drink, pink ink.
So….if you have a lot of ink, then you should get a Yink, I think.”
– From “One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish“
We could not have a party without a reference to one of our favorite Dr. Seuss board books, Hop on Pop. With peanut butter sandwiches, apples, and bananas, the kids and adults could “Eat a snack with Brown and Black“.
Since this was Eden and Xen’s first birthday we didn’t opt to do a traditional birthday cake, not when we could make cute Cat in the Hat themed cupcakes. We made both Thing One and Thing Two cupcakes as well as cupcakes with the famous stovetop hat. The hat was made of marshmallow and red frosting.
There were other dessert options that included Grape Ape Cakes (recipe can be found in the Green Eggs and Ham Cookbook), Yertle’s Caramel Turtles, and Truffula Tree Berries which completed the dessert table.
Before I move on from food I guess I should mention the Seusstastical Candy Bar. This was super fun for me to design, making everything blue. We had blue gummy sharks (One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish), foot lollipops (The Foot Book), and cotton candy (truffula trees). The other blue candies including peeps, licorice sticks, rock candy, and sixlets.
So as you can tell this Dr. Seuss themed birthday party was centered around food, lots and lots of food. Our guests left with full bellies and plenty of sugar to rot their teeth. Although this was done for one-year-old twins, many of these ideas could be incorporated into a Dr. Seuss themed birthday party for any age, perhaps even a Dr. Seuss loving adult.