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Coolest Yellow Submarine 3rd Birthday Party

Last summer, for my son Leo’s 3rd Birthday, he asked for a Beatles Yellow Submarine Party. He was crazy obsessed with the movie, their music, our Beatles Rockband game and he just couldn’t get enough of them. He knew all their names and the instruments they played and he made sure that every person at the local grocery store or library knew. I threw a Beatles Bash for our 65 closest friends and family (my husband and I have two very large families) on a budget of only $300!

The Menu

Leo’s all time favorite food, at the time, (we all know how fickle toddlers can be) were tacos or nachos. For a while we were on a first-name basis with the employees at our local Chipotle. Anyhow, a simple menu of Mexican DIY Tacos, Burritos, Salad and Nachos was by far the easiest and most cost-efficient way I have ever fed a party. With help from my little sister, we managed to make seasoned ground beef, basmati rice with fresh lime juice and cilantro, organic black beans, homemade pico de gallo and fresh guacamole. Then in cute, colorful containers we made a taco bar with torn romaine lettuce, the pico, the guac, black olives, jalapeno and sour cream. My husband’s brothers went up for seconds and thirds, the kids at the party had fun making everything custom and for the vegetarians or light eaters, they could make a flavorful, tex-mex salad. Also, the food was so inexpensive because we prepared it all ourselves, so we were still able to get enough bottles of cerveza for the adults to enjoy.

The Cake

Beatles Birthday Party

Coolest Kid Birthday Party

For almost every event that I have ever organized in honor of my one and only little boy, I almost always make or order a carrot cake. I feel like it is such a nice alternative that most people aren’t expecting when they attend a child’s party. To keep costs down, I ordered a generic, music themed, giant sheet cake from Costco for only $18.00 and had them ice it and customize it. Since the theme was the Beatles and the Yellow Submarine, it was pretty hard to find decorations and while I am pretty crafty at most things, the art of pastry is not one of them. I found images online (since they were for my own personal use) and blew them up to stretch across letter size paper. I then glued them to colored, thick, poster board and trimmed out the shapes with a sharp razor, stuck a few craft popsicle sticks to the bottom and there you have it, the cheapest, themed out cake for a party of 60+ people.

Beatles Birthday Party

The Decor

Since the backyard is already pretty green and colorful with our swing set and red umbrellas, I never want to do too much in this area. I instead spent time making the tables comfortable for our guests using bright-colored place mats and simple tea lights in mason jars (which I use for almost every outdoor party).

Beatles Birthday Party

I did make my own face-in-the-hole Yellow Submarine for the kids (and parents) to use to take pictures. This was such a hit that I now offer it for all of my themed parties. It was very easy, very cheap and I finished it in only 2 naps!

Coolest Beatles Yellow Submarine Games and Activities

Beatles Birthday Party

We played the Beatles Musical Chairs and used alphabet rubber mats instead of chairs (easier for the littles).

Beatles Birthday Party

Beatles Birthday Party

We also played Pin the “Glasses on John Lennon”! My friend, Angie, a graphic designer, offered to make the game board and I lucked out and found round, paper eyeglasses in the party aisle at Target. It turned out so cute!

Beatles Birthday Party

Beatles Birthday Party

Since it is always so easy to do, I made up a trivia game about the Beatles for all of the adults to play. The 3 winning couples got to pick out a Beatles DVD to take home.

Beatles Yellow Submarine Favors and Favor Bags

Again, with the suggestion from my crafty friend, Angie – she recommended the toy-a-day blog to search for 3D Yellow Submarine paper templates. Can you believe they had them?! We then formatted the template ourselves to leave openings on the top so that they could be used as goodies bags.

Beatles Birthday Party

In the end, after it was all said and done, the party was a success and worth all of the extra effort and attention to detail: the kids and their parents relaxed and had fun, it was a beautiful August night – but most importantly, Leo had a great time. He rocked out to the Beatles all night long or at least until he passed out from all the fun and attention.

Coolest Kid Birthday Party

The lesson learned: It was a total trade-off – it was a lot of work and prep time, but I stuck to a very modest budget! It was fun to go crazy with new party theme that also appealed to all of the parents…but most importantly, Leo had the BEST time and rocked out all night to the Beatles music we played. :)

Beatles Birthday Party

16 thoughts on “Coolest Yellow Submarine 3rd Birthday Party”

  1. Awesome!! Very creative! It’s so nice to see a fresh, well done, creative theme amidst all the “same ol’ same ol'” you see at kids’ parties. Keep them coming! Great job!!!

  2. This party idea seems so PERFECT for a party that will please kids AND adults. Love the food ideas too. Also we love to make custom iPod playlists for parties and this theme sure makes it easy to customize the music! thanx for posting.

  3. That is the coolest party! My daughter has asked for a Beatles party as well. I would love to use your template for the Beatles favor bags. So rad!!!

  4. Awesome party idea! My daughter is also in love with The Beatles. She has been asking for her next bday party to be yellow submarine themed. Could you please let me know excatly where you got the template for the favor bags? Thanks so much

  5. I would also love the temples of the fab four. I am hosting a grandparents day at my childrens school and this would be great to have on the tables.

  6. I’m planning a Beatles themed party for my daughter and love to have the template you used to make the favor bags.

  7. I stumbled across this while looking for party favors for my Beatles-themed wedding! It’s great to see that Leo has such awesome taste in music at a young age! The party and everything look awesome! I especially like “Pin the glasses on John Lennon”. Great work!

  8. Prior to construction, you must swap the “top of the paper toy” to be the “bottom of the favor bag” when you trimming out each one.

  9. Hi Patty,

    I didn’t see a link to the favor bags, can you send that to me? My email address is jlindenb@hotmail.com I also LOVE the submarine photo cut out. Did you have a template for that? Did you just have it printed at like a kinkos or something? Can you email that to me as well? I am throwing a surprise party for my husband’s 30th and would love to do something similar! Too cool!

  10. Wow! Since she was born I’ve been wanting a Yellow submarine for my daughter, but I have to wait until she’s aware and really can enjoy this event. So, for her 6th, next year I will and since we are Mexican, we’ll make this Yellow Submarine pinata. I’m just passing by collecting ideas. Great of all them!!!

  11. I found it on Pinterest – just search for Pastiche Events Chicago and you will come across it. The Beatles favor bag templates are on there. For some reason, this site won’t let me post the url. Good luck!

  12. My daughter is obsessed with Yellow Submarine right now too… loves the whole album, the movie, there is a book on iTunes so I was thinking of throwing her a Yellow Submarine party and found this. This is great!!! Nice job.

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