My youngest boy turned three last week – THREE! He is growing up so fast that I just can’t seem to keep up.

His actual birthday was on Thursday so we celebrated by going to the boy’s favourite place for dinner and held a small party for him on Saturday and invited some close friends and family.

It was a no-brainer that we would base the party around Thomas and Friends. Both boys are huge train fans; in fact I don’t think there is a day goes by without them playing with trains.

I usually love planning parties but I’ve been a bit under the weather recently and not been feeling myself, so my good friend Natalie helped out.

Here’s how I created a Thomas & Friends themed party:
Thomas colours are blue and red so even if you decide not to buy any Thomas branded items you can create a uniform theme using these colours.

Bunting and Balloons
I bought my balloons from Amazon, and my friend Natalie created the bunting from red and blue card which she cut into triangles and wove through ribbon bought from eBay. She has a very nifty machine that cut out the Thomas silhouette onto vinyl which she then stuck onto the bunting.

Themed Party pack
A party pack from Party Bags and Supplies also helped along with the theme.

The pack came with the following:

• Table cover
• 16 Napkins
• 8 plates
• 8 cups
• 8 pre-filled party bags

In the past when we have bought plastic table covers they only just fit, so I was pleasantly surprised that the table cover fit over our dining room table perfectly and was of good quality.

The party bag was filled with a Thomas whistle (the kids LOVED that but the adults? Not so much) train tickets, stickers, prism viewer and a Thomas spin disc. Having been so busy on the run-up to the party this party pack made things easier in the whole party planning process.

Themed cupcake toppers
I managed to buy some bargain cupcake cases from Aldi that contained blue and red cases which matched the Thomas theme. I made a selection of chocolate, and vanilla cupcakes from my trusted Hummingbird Bakery cookbook and my friend Natalie put these awesome cupcake toppers together from blue and red card, toothpicks and printed two designs on paper to stick all together. I find it’s much cheaper to make your own toppers which can be personalised rather than buying them which can be pricey.

Birthday cake
I ummed and ahhed over making my own cake but with work and all that has been going on with my dizzy spells and tinnitus,s I didn’t have the energy. Tesco came to my rescue with this cool iced cake and to be fair it looked much better than anything I would have attempted to do myself. The best thing? It only cost me £10 and fed 8 children and 12 adults and we still had some leftover.

Et voila! A Thomas and Friends themed party without having to spend ridiculous amounts of money!

How do you plan a themed party?

* We were sent the Thomas & Friend party pack for the purpose of this post. All opinions and images unless otherwise stated are my own.

Related posts:

Celebrating Thomas’ VIP 70th Birthday Thomas & Friends: The Great Race Premiere Review: Thomas & Friends Adventures Shark Escape Review: Thomas & Friends MINIS Motorised Raceway & The Great Race DVD