When Ella told me she wanted to go bowling with friends for her birthday I was like ok, that’s cool. It was then followed by NO DECOR Mom… Well, c’mon. You know that’s not gonna happen… So I kept it to just a tablescape and decided on boho bowling because I wanted something a little more fresh. So here’s a recap of our Boho Bowling Birthday for our new 11 year old!
First, did you know bowling resources are not easy to find?! And most out there felt dated so I ended up kind of having to make my own. Canva, of course was my go to for the invite which became what I ended up designing around. That and the adorable cake topper. But here’s my mood board for the party.
Once I nailed down what I wanted to do, I just had to find everything. The hardest finds I knew would be the trophies (and they were never found, but keep reading to see what I ended up doing). I thought a cute little bowling bag and pins would work on the table. And since my husband hates me buying things for no real reason, I was on major budget.
I found a vintage bowling bag (and ball that I’m now stuck with for no real reason) at Salvation Army for $4.99. I thought that was a steal and worth the $5 investment. I intended to paint it, but time ran out and the color worked just fine. I also found a kids bowling set there as well for $4.99 too. I spray painted those to match the party color palette.
Outside of those big things, I also decided to make a cake. I tried a big one out for her real birthdate, but didn’t want to do that again, so we fixed up a store-bought cake. I used a tutorial from Handmade Charlotte and covered donut holes in chocolate that matched the color scheme and topped the cake with those. This project ended up looking a lot different than hers. In the end it had a more artsy feel than her more clean looking one, but because my donut holes looked a lot messier, I decided to go with it and splatter the sides of the cake with the chocolate too, giving it that more Jackson Pollock look.
We also added this adorable cake topper from Avalon Sunshine that worked perfectly with everything!
We were taking the girls bowling so that was part of their “goodie bag” but what bowlers don’t need good socks!?! This was also incase they forgot, but they all wore them so they just took them home with them. I rolled them up and added a little bowling pin tag that I printed out that morning and said “Thanks for rollin’ with me! Love, Ella.”
When I started looking for plates and such I couldn’t find anything I really loved either so I decided to just make my own. With it being a small crowd I decided to take this on… If it were any bigger than four guests, I could NOT have done this. But I just grabbed clear plates and yellow and magenta vinyl from dollar tree and used my cricut to cut out these adorable MCM style bowling pins and add it to the bottom of the plates. So easy but it did take a little more time than I expected to weed the image. Other than that, added these birthday napkins & whimsy flatware to finish it out.
I also made cookies. Yes, I made them. I joke that they didn’t look perfect, but they definitely could have looked worse. And they tasted good! But I bought a cookie cutter specifically to try this out and make cookies that matched the party. While there’s still work to be done on my cookie decorating skills, they were just fine for this party and a great first attempt!
Outside of that, we added some Jones Sodas, trophies, macarons, and gold disco balls to the table. I also used a remnant of a brown paper roll from Five Below and added some arrow to make it look more like a bowling alley lane. It took all of like 2min and, I think, really was a nice touch!
Ok, so the trophies. In my head I was going to have these adorable vintage bowling trophies, but they were nowhere to be found for a reasonable price. I was willing to spend about $35 on one and that didn’t seem in the cards. Shipping was insane. Then, I thought, well I’ll just get some toppers and make my own. Well, that didn’t happen because again, shipping was stupid. So around 10am on the day of the party, I realized, we might have old hockey trophies in the basement. WINNING! I printed out some bowling pins from Canva, taped them over the hockey players and I’m not hating it. Listen, perfect isn’t always an option.
And on that note, real quick. I don’t create these tablescapes in an effort to blow people out of the water. I create them because they make me happy and I feel like most times, mine are recreate-able by YOU. They aren’t perfect, and maybe that’s what makes them feel so good. A lot of times, the paint is wrong, the setting sucks, I forget about crumbs, I just threw it together, but I did it. Again, magical moments don’t have to be perfect… they just need to make someone feel special and I think we accomplished that.
So what I’m saying is, next time you think you can do it, make a list of what you are wanting to do, draw it out, run to goodwill, get a little dirty with some DIYs and I bet you can! hahah
CHECK OUT THESE OTHER TABLESCAPES
So, that’s it. Breakdown on this tablescape was actually pretty cheap. The party itself thanks to bowling was NOT so cheap… did you know how expensive bowling is?!! Or maybe I’m just cheap, but damn! And the place was packed! So good thing the tablescape was pretty affordable!
Cake: Meijer, $14.99
Donut Holes: Meijer, $4.99
Melting Chocolate: 3 bags, $4ea
Cake Topper : Avalon Sunshine, gifted
Bowling Bag & Pins : Salvation Army, $11 (Similar)
Trophies: Meijer, $4.99
Jones Sodas
Disco Balls: Had
Runner: Had
Trophies: Had
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