Bike Rally Party

The Dollar Tree is my friend, people! I did an entire party on a budget and I don't think anyone could tell or really cared (to be honest). We hosted a Bike Rally at our house in lieu of a bowling alley party. I literally only spent maybe $100, including the cake! Like I said in the previous post, I got this idea in the Family Fun magazine from years ago, but they luckily still have it on their website. We sent our invitations (see previous post) that my wonderful friend, Cheri made for us on Photoshop (I think is what it is called) FOR FREE so that all I had to do was print them and hand them out. We had everyone bring their bikes and helmets for some party fun. When the guests arrived we had a table set up for them to make name plates for their bikes (plastic plates $1 and foam letters$2).

While they worked on those I placed noise makers on their wheels out of plastic plates (cut in a rectangle, of course) so that they would have a "motor". Once they were all done, I stated the rules and off they went down the painted driveway and under the pool noodle arch we had made. I purchased sidewalk paint by Crayola ($9) and painted a yellow line down our road (which happens to be a quiet little county road with not much traffic) along with a u-turn arrow and red line for boundaries.

Can you see the words. Oh, I also had cones for weaving in and out, but the wind kept blowing them away!

I had also made road signs for them to follow. The kids seemed to really enjoy riding up and down the road many many times. My nephew said he road 7 miles that day. He has an odometer on his bike (I gotta get one of those!).

After some serious riding, I split the kids up in ages and played the game "Stop and Go" with more signs I had made. For snacks, I made a traditional trail mix ($5) and served Gatorade ($10). The paper goods all came from, yep you guessed it, THE DOLLAR TREE! The cake was a doosey I should say. I totally copied Family Fun's idea, but my cake stuck to the bottom of the pan (not enough grease!) so I had to serve it out of the pan. I was not a happy party planner from that point on, but it all worked out okay. The bike was interesting to make as well. FYI, black Twizzlers (for the tires) are not easy to keep in a circle! I tried everything! Anyway, Nolan loved it and that is all that mattered.

We had a really great time and appreciated all of our guests coming. Nolan had many friends and even Grandma from Mississippi along with Cheri and her family. We were super excited!
After opening up a ton of gifts Nolan passed out his party favors. I bought some cute sports water bottles from Walmart (.97 cents each) and filled them with candy from the dollar store. I also found, again at the dollar store, some die cut gold trophies out of cardstock to tape to the bottle that stated "You are a Winner!" They turned out really neat to give away.

Yes that is our garage. We were very lucky it didn't rain, but the wind was gusty!

Party favors.

We had a lot of fun, any really it was not that much work. Really.