Continuing with the literature-inspired theme of Theo’s 2nd birthday, this year we opted to go with the theme of the book “Go, Dog, Go!” by P.D. Eastman. At the end of the story, the dogs all have a “big dog party” and that was all it took for me to run with this theme.

We had activities based on the book such as decorating party hats. I also made “3” sugar cookies and had the kids decorate their own. This was the first year we held Theo’s party at our new house (that we had just moved into the month before) and we were excited to use the great backyard space.

This year I went back to our tried-and-true Costco sheet cake and discovered that they will do custom designs based on specific input. I printed my own edible sheet of an illustration from the book and placed it on the cake myself.

The party favor bags were filled with items that were found within the pages of the book. Each kid received a personalized “dog tag,” and the bags contained things like sunglasses, pinwheels, and other knick knacks.

The food was of course also themed — I remember having a jolt of inspiration the night before the party (when most of the food was already prepared) and thought that ALL of the snacks and food would be orange, white, and green colored. I made pasta salad from a bag of multi-colored pasta and took out all of the purple noodles. We also had store-bought doggie biscuit cookies (for humans to eat).

Hosting this party at our own home was nice, but it was also a million times more work. I’m glad we went all out b/c I will likely never host a party this size at our house again! It was truly a “Go, Christina, Go!” experience. Exhausting but fun.