PART TWO: 11th Birthday Party Details for Hot Air Balloon SURPRISE

Today I'm sharing all the details of Titus' Hot Air Balloon Surprise Birthday that we celebrated this March.

 Titus turned eleven this year.  I just shared last week about his surprise birthday visit at school from the lemonade truck!  For his party, I had another fun surprise planned.  He chose an intimate family celebration and only wanted to invite one friend.  Tristin, is one of his best buds, and Tristin's mama is one of my girlfriends!   We also invited my family over -- grandparents, uncle, best friend, brothers -- a GOOD crowd for this party!

Titus and Tristin 

Hot Air Balloon Party

Up, Up, Up!

Yes, I used a theme for this eleven year old boy of mine!  Riding in a hot air balloon is on his bucket list.   I designed the party around revealing the surprise gift of revealing to him that he had a hot air balloon ride ticket in the near future.

The Gifts...

To present the hot air balloon ride gift certificate gift, I found a big cardboard box.  I wrote clues all over the box to puzzle his brain and to make him wonder.

I filled the box with a lot of books from the library ALL about hot air balloons.  Then, I stuffed packing paper in the box, and balloons that looked like the sky.  On top of all of this, I left an envelope with gold writing.  Inside the envelope was a hot air balloon themed card that announced his gift. 

This is the cute card I found from etsy!  It fit with our theme perfectly.

A hot air balloon ride! Woohoo!  I gave him the option of inviting his brothers to go up also.  He wanted them to join.  Kotah said YES and Cameron politely declined. ;)

Celebrating!

These are the library books I stacked in his big surprise box too.  

He had the opportunity to read books

 all about hot air balloons 

BEFORE he took off on his own flight. 

**Side note** If you're wanting to plan your own hot air balloon study, there are a lot of excellent resources available for science projects and experiments related to how hot air balloons work!

 One of my favorite childhood books is The Twenty-One Balloons!  This book is a keeper! 

I always combine party theme decor with the gifts.  One of Titus' gift was a super cool hot air balloon shirt.  I got a similar one too!  We both wore them for part of the night and saved them to wear again on our special hot air balloon day out!

Our party celebration continued on in theme,

The Decor...

I kept the decor in black and white 

with bits of Titus' favorite color, orange.

I ordered this balloon print from etsy.  Again, I ALWAYS love to combine decor with gifts.  

Titus could keep this print as a memory and frame it in his room after the party.

I also bought little balloon charms 

and tied them to drinkware for party favors.  

I did this last year too for his paper airplane birthday.

It's a longtime ritual to toast with champagne after hot air balloon flights. 

 I decorated with flutes and mock champagne to carry on that idea.

Cheers to the sky!

Party bites...

The Cake...

For his birthday dessert, Titus picked angel food cake.  I made a homemade angel food cake with a citrus frosting.  All the recipes I used for this party were from America's Test Kitchen.

Homemade fresh lemon curd...Mmmmm!

This cake coincidentally matched his lemonade birthday surprise at school!

 I also made a homemade pound cake.  I served them with a fresh made lemon curd, fresh whipped cream, and berries.

 Happy Birthday to you!

 The fun and games...

 For our birthday party activity I ordered giant Japanese lanterns.  I thought they imitated hot air balloons.  We lit them and released them into the dark sky.  We've done this before for my Dad's "Light Up the Dark" birthday party!

Magic jumps out in the dark when colors and light illuminate our eyes. 

The happy thing about celebrating another birthday

is that we're given another year 

to look up, 

to wishlist more memories, 

and to make dreams as high as the sky. 

Titus, always be a dreamer.  

We love you, forever.

Happy Birthday.

Check out Titus' super fun Paper-Airplane-Makin' Birthday last year 

and my Dad's Light-Up-the-Dark Birthday 

from a previous year

for moore great party ideas!

This is part TWO of a THREE part blog series. 

See here for more of the story:
PART ONE, Lemonade Truck Surprise at School

PART THREE, ((Coming soon)) Up in the Sky Hot Air Balloon Adventure





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