Favors at Birthday party - a must?

grlmom16 · September 2013

As I am trying to think of a favor to hand out at my daughter's upcoming party, I started wondering if I really even needed to do one? We are having a pizza party at a local park/playground. What are your thoughts? Does every party you go to have favors, or did you - will you have some at your own LO's party?

JenniCollins · September 2013

Not needed, but a nice touch. We do favors at every birthday, I think it's a nice "thanks for coming". I just helped plan a 3rd birthday party for a little friend, it was Little Einsteins themed and each kid got a maraca as a favor. The kids loved them. We've only been to one party that didn't have "favors" but she had a piñata filled with candies and little toys so each child went home with a bag of goodies from that.

wedsept · September 2013

I have never been to a party without favors. I think the kids like them and look forward to them.

D&HMom · September 2013

do something useful. A friend did a mason jar with ingredients layered for chocolate chip cookies. that was fun cuz we got to bake together at home.

For the twins second bday, the $ store had cute sesame street cups and snack containers. I filled the containers with animal cookies.

you also can't go wrong with crayons/coloring book,

LouRN09 · September 2013

For DS 3rd birthday, I had small bags of popcorn with a Toy Story themed sticker on the outside that said "Thanks for coming to my party!" We have a popcorn station here locally and was able to get a good deal on large bags and I just made lots of small party-favor sized bags out of them in two different flavors. It was a big hit for both kids and parents!!

chardonnay24 · September 2013

I don't think they're a must. I like doing them because I'm really into all the details involved in party planning, but I've definitely been to parties without favors and we don't miss them. I hardly think that a bunch of 2 or 3 year olds would notice or care. :-)

Last year, we had an airplane themed party and I did stickers and airplane shaped crayons. For our upcoming Halloween party, we're doing little coloring/activity books, crayons, stickers, and Playdoh. For his 3rd birthday, which is camping themed, I've only purchased "twig" colored pencils, but I'm thinking of including little flashlights as well.

TiffanyBerry · September 2013

While I respect that some parents love favors (and the kids, of course), I hate them. Then again, I'm not wild on pseudo-mandatory gift giving either. So I'm an odd one out here. Maybe some sort of fun craft they could take home?

dairygirl19 · September 2013

I'm with Tiffany.

Favors are not all that common here. Like I only here about favors on the internet uncommon.

If you don't want to do it, don't. There's no mandatory rule you have to.

I'd skip it. I hate extra crap too. I really don't understand why and I'm really starting to hate the "Everyone needs a gift all the time, just for showing up." ideal that seems to be going on in the world right now. Whatever happened to, "It's just nice to be invited and play. That's gift enough."

Signed,

Dairy

Who didn't even have favors at her wedding, muchless will she start doing them at a kiddie birthday party.

fancynewbeesly · September 2013

Favors are common here. Actually when I was a kid, my parents had favors at our party. So definitely not a new "trend" in our area.

[Deleted User] · September 2013

Not a must but they can be nice, especially if they're consumable (not necessarily edible, but something that gets used up and doesn't just become another junk toy in the house).

LSU628 · September 2013

I hate parties where the favors are a bunch of junk that I just throw away. I did pretzel rods dipped in chocolate with red, white and blue sprinkles for DD's 2nd party (it was an Olympics themed gymnastics party) , none for her 3rd and her 4th I did teacup and teapot shaped cookies.

grlmom16 · September 2013

Thanks for the honest opinions! I don't want to, but I may. Depends on what I get done and when. It'll be the last thing on my list, that's for sure.

grlmom16 · September 2013

My only thought was since it's a Monkey party was making banana cake cookies and wrapping them to hand out. My friend had the idea of some monkey stickers too. We'll see.

sucredee · September 2013

Personally I could totally do without them but I think it is sort of the norm here so I do it anyway. This last year what I ended up doing is thank you notes in each favor bag, some stickers and then a book from the dollar bin at target and bubbles. I try to avoid candy

TiffanyBerry · September 2013

dairygirl19 mentioned weddings...

When we did "favors" at our wedding, it was actually a photo, taken at the reception, with ourselves and each of our guests (or a small group of guests) which we sent to them in a thank you card (even if it was just a "thanks for coming" because they didn't get us a gift - which was fine by us!). I wonder if kids would like that - pictures of themselves with the birthday boy/girl?

Soap1 · September 2013

I quit doing favors at birthday parties. I always toss the junky favors we get at parties, and people always forget to take them even when I go to the trouble of making/buying them.

kristennd · September 2013

Our family's rule of thumb is favors if the party is at home but not if we're hosting it out somewhere. Eg., if we paid everyone's admission, that's the favor.

RachieTK · October 2013

We've always given a favor and gotten them at kids parties, though they aren't big at weddings here. We've done a straw cup to match the theme filled with sticks and sidewalk chalk//bubbles/stickers in a sand pail - but those were at his parties with only family friends, so 10 kids. This year, favors will be less expensive since his party will have school friends too, so many more kids.