All pooch lovers would absolutely enjoy a dog themed Birthday party! My son Hudson loves animals and was super excited about his 6th Birthday Puppy Party. Everybody wants to keep costs (and effort!) down. So I came up with some printable decor for the perfect, colourfully cute party. This isn't just a party for children or humans for that matter. People love to celebrate their furry friends, there are some great ideas you could use for your own dog's Birthday.
I'll run through those ideas, the food and the cute puppy puns below. If you're interested in these printables, I have these dog themed Birthday party supplies plus more items that you can check out in my shop. Don't forget to watch the video below to get a better look at the party table and decorations. I also go through how I assemble my printables so you might pick up a couple of tips there too!
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Get Ready to Pawty! Invitation + Signs
The invite sets the scene for the party! I love how fun and colourful this design is. I thought messy paint splatters would make a nice touch as puppies love to get into messy mischief. This is a 5×7″ invitation, with all text being fully editable. You can even select different fonts and colours if you like.
Above our dog themed Birthday party table, I hung some banner flags. When I've previously used party banners like this, I would edit them to say “Happy Birthday” and also include the person's name after that. But this was just too much for me – additional cutting and assembling. So I simply created flags to spell out my son's name. This now saves me more time to create other party decor… winning! Since I was just sticking these to the wall, all I did was blu-tac the flags. Then for effect, I hung string behind so that it really looked the part.
Lastly, I had an 8×10″/5×7″ sign which is the perfect size for table tops. As this sign is editable also, I created my own message “Come sit, stay – Hudson's 6th Birthday party” in the 8×10 size. Most of us have an 8×10″ frame or two around so these pop easily into those. They also come in a smaller 5×7 size. You don't need to limit yourself to just one sign though! During the editing process, you can create as many pages as you need for more signs.
Other types of cute puppy party signs you could have:
- Bone Appetit (food)
- Please Take a Doggy Bag (treat bags)
- Thanks for Making my Party Pawsome!
- Thanks for Coming to my Pawty!
- Let's Pawty!
- Pawty Time!
- Cards + Gifts
- Hot Dog Station
- Adopt a Puppy (favors, crafts)
If you don't want to worry about editing signs, these printables come in some premade “as-is” signs in various sayings. You can also save by bundling some of them.
Dog Themed Birthday Party Cake
If you came here looking for an elaborate cake to make for your pooch or the Birthday human, I'm sorry but I am a terrible baker! Now that I think about it though, let me know in the comments below if you would like some ideas. I can round up my favourite clever dog cakes in another article for you.
Now, if you are someone who doesn't have much time for cakes then I have a solution for you! These little puppy characters are so adorable. I cut them and attached them to food skewers with some tape. That's all there was to the cake. It was a plain white iced cake I bought from the supermarket. I think the colourful sprinkles combined with those cute puppy faces detract from the fact that it's just a cheap cake!
You could also use these cute characters as cutouts for a project, as part of a party game or as additional party decor. Just be very careful when mixing lit candles with paper cake toppers. Keep the candles at a distance from the toppers and supervise very closely.
The Pupcakes…
I always love to include cupcakes at a Birthday party. Even though there's an actual cake at the end, some people don't want a massive piece of cake or the little ones get a little antsy waiting for the main event. These cupcake toppers for my “Pupcakes” are perfect to add to our theme. As I did with the cake centrepieces, I cut these round toppers out and attached them to a toothpick with some tape. They are 2″ round so if you have a paper punch that size, it makes cutting them much quicker!
They include 4 dog faces and the phrases “Let's Pawty” and “Pawty Time”. These tags that I used aren't editable but you could also use them as gift tags, on cookies or on your favor bags. Update: I have just released editable cupcake toppers so you can create your own special message on them!
Puppy Party Food Ideas
I think this just might be my favourite part of our party. Coming up with dog themed food ideas and cute puns was fun. Of course, it wouldn't be any fun without the food tents to label exactly what the food is. These food tents are also great as place cards or card toppers on treat bags. Below is some of the puppy food I had on the table plus a couple of additional ideas.
- Chew Sticks – licorice strips or Haribo Balla Stixxs
- Pup Corn – popcorn
- Scoop a Poop – chocolate logs or fun size Twix
- Pawtato Chips – potato chips
- Pupcakes – cupcakes
- Pawty Cookies – cookies or macarons
- Puppy Chow
- Hot Dogs (or a hot dog station)
If your party is for a dog, you could also customize these to suit them. Provide actual dog chew sticks, dog-friendly cupcakes and bone-shaped biscuits for cookies etc.
I also wrapped some Hershey bars in our puppy party theme. These candy bar wrappers are editable with your own text. For these chocolate bars, I used precut foil. However, I do also have a video with my blog post on how to wrap your chocolate bars with aluminium foil from home.
Lastly, I had water bottles wrapped with Hudson's Birthday party message. If you watch the video above, I also show you how they look using small glass milkshake jars. They look super cute with a straw. Both the drink bottles and the candy bars could also be included as part of the party favors.
Party Favors
Our party favors were in simple white paper bags that I attached a gift tag to. There are actually two different tags as I couldn't fit all 6 adorable puppy faces on one. On the Dachshund + friends favor tag the message read “Thank you for making my party Pawsome! Love Hudson” and I highlighted Pawsome in red. For the Chihuahua + friends favor tag the message reads “Thank you for coming to my pawty! Love Hudson”, with “pawty!” highlighted in green.
You could angle the tags and cut the corners if you like. To make it simple, using miniature craft pegs, I clipped the tags to the top of the bags.
As I mentioned above, you could use the candy bars or the drink bottles to hand out as favors. Other suggestions you could include in your party favors might be dog toys, bandanas, dog grooming products, and homemade dog treats (or bone-shaped cookies for the humans), dog themed stationery or dog books.
Some people have an Apopt a Puppy party. These are so cute and you could apply that here too. The take-home favor could be a sweet dog plushy or you could come up with a crafting station so guests can make their own puppies to take home.
Dog Themed Birthday Party Supplies
Okay, here comes my shameless plug… I love printable party supplies – they're great for last-minute and allow you to create something really special on a budget. Much of the dog themed Birthday party supplies that I made for this party are fully customizable. You can create your own special message, change the font styles, colours, sizing and more.
The decor I have used here are just some of the items that I have in this product line. Other puppy party printables I have currently include:
- Large editable welcome sign 16″ x 20″ and 18″ x 24″
- Editable thank you card 5×7
- Round + Square 2″ editable tags – Chihuahua + friends
- Round + Square 2″ editable tags – Dachshund + friends
- Editable cupcake toppers 2″ round + square
- Various graphic as-is 8×10/5×7 signs or grab them in a Birthday bundle
- Graphic highchair banners (great for cake smashes!)
In summing up…
I kept the rest of the decorations pretty simple since there is so much colour to this theme. Each year I order helium balloons in an amount to refelt the age my kids are turning. This was Hudson's sixth Birthday so he had six balloons. I take a photo with their balloons each year so we can look back to see how much they've changed. I have a feeling I'm going to have a hard time getting the kids to participate when they hit their teen years!
Whether it's a party for your furry friend or a human, a dog themed birthday party is a great idea for all ages. A super fun element to your party would be to encourage your guests to dress up in dog themed outfits to really get into the spirit. Or, if they have well-behaved puppies, invite them to bring their dogs along.
I hope you got some great ideas from Hudson's 6th Birthday party! He absolutely loved it. I'd love to know your favourite Birthday party theme for kids. Perhaps you've organised the party or attended? Let me know in the comments below.
Other resources you may like:
FREEBIE: Happy Birthday Activity Mat
FREEBIE: Ultimate Party Planning Checklist
ARTICLE: 28 Awesome Boys Birthday Party Ideas
ARTICLE: Super Amazing Super Mario Birthday Party
SHOP: Dog Pawty Party Printables
