Birthday Party Themes: Adopt A Puppy Party

Thank you to Dana of Calgary Playground Review for sharing her Adopt a Puppy Party with us! Check out her blog for loads of great information about Calgary’s playgrounds and parks!

This year my daughter Nicky asked for a puppy adoption party. She was super excited and we ended up spending a month planning out all the details. I would not normally spend nearly so much time planning a kid’s birthday party, but she loved it so much that it was fun for both of us.

Want to plan your own Adopt a Puppy Party? Here’s what we did!

The Kids:

Thirteen kids attended. This including a mix of family and friends. Most of the kids were 5 or 6 years old.

Party Length

I set the party for 3 hours to make sure the paint would have time to dry. This ended up being a touch long – 2.5 hours would have been better.

The Decorations

I bought a set of puppy adoption party printables from Printer Fairy on Etsy and printed them off at Staples. The package also included an adoption certificate and Vet Check-up Checklist. We also had paw print party decorations (hats, tablecloth, etc).

The Food

We kept the food fairly simple and served hot dogs, chips, and puppy chow (Reese cereal and Nesquik Cereal mixed together).

For the cake Nicky really wanted cupcakes made in ice cream cones. (Tip: put a few chocolate chips in the bottom of the cone to help keep them steady and add some extra flavor at the bottom.) We decorated the cup cakes with M&Ms and mini Oreos to create paw prints. Nicky loved that she was able to create the paw prints by herself.

The Activities

As each child arrived, they went to the ‘adoption centre’ to pick their puppy. I had more puppies than kids to make sure that everyone would be able to have a few choices. Picking the puppies out right away avoided any issues about who got to pick first or conflict over two kids wanting the same stuffy.

If you are looking to save money, shop around. It’s surprising how much the prices can vary for the same product. Here in Calgary, we found the Discovery Hut to have the best prices or you can buy them online.

I also made little fleece blankets for each puppy from extra fleece fabric I had on hand. If you don’t have any, you can buy it by the yard.

After they picked their puppy, they filled out their adoption certificate (with a little help). Nicky wanted to be the vet so she gave each of the puppies a check-up.

The kids also made puppy collars using beads and pipe cleaners. The pipe cleaners made it easy but they were kind of pokey and the kids had a little trouble tying them on securely so you may need an adult helper.

The kids each painted a dog bowl for their new puppies using Q-tips and quick drying acrylic paint. I found the dog bowls for $1 each from Ikea. After the paint was dry, I sprayed the dog bowls with a clear acrylic sealer to keep the paint from flaking off.

I set up a puppy day care centre nearby to keep the puppies paint free while their new owners were painting. We couldn’t have the new arrivals going home from the puppy party with paint on them!

I grabbed a few things from around the house to create a puppy spa in the play room. The kids really liked having some time to play with their puppies when they were done the other activities.

After the cake, the kids decorated cardboard gable boxes with markers, stamps and stickers to carry their puppies home in. Tip: do not set up the boxes until after they have been decorated.

The puppies and dog bowls doubled as the activity and the goody bag.