The birthday party ‘goodie bag’ reimagined

My son is in elementary school and goes to a lot of birthday parties. One highlight for him, besides being with his friends, is the quick thrill involved with tearing into a brightly-colored plastic bag and finding a bunch of knicknacks that will inevitably be quickly tossed and likely end-up in a landfill for hundreds-to-thousands of years. I don’t like the idea of encouraging this wasteful flood of quick-thrill plastic, nor the idea that more stuff is somehow needed, but I also don’t want to be the birthday party grinch. So this year for my son’s party we attempted something new:  a goodie bag filled with second hand and handmade goodies.

We started by looking for some ideas online, looking through our art box and garden, and taking a trip to the local art thrift store. We looked for things that were plastic-free, useful, but still playful. We thought about doing something like an experience or activity for kids to take home, like a pot and seeds to plant or measured ingredients and a cookie recipe. We also thought about arranging a toy swap or clothing swap. Ultimately, we decided to simply mimick the good ol’ goodie bag, but have it be just a bit more planet friendly. 

Our daily ritual after school and work for a couple weeks was to make some of the “goodies”  for these bags. It became a time where we swapped stories as we sewed and got glue stuck on our fingers. We discussed why we were reimagining party favors. We gossiped. I asked him if he thought his friends would prefer store-bought trinkets. He said, “no way; this stuff is unique.”

Here is what ended up in our goodie bags:

• Rocks from our summer adventures that had been in his rock tumbler
• Handmade notebooks 
• Acorn ornaments 
• Origami seed packages with seeds collected from our garden
• Clay goldfish
• Little boards from the art thrift store
• Pencils with flower origami at the end
• Handmade pencil bags with seed buttons
• Shells

It would be a lot easier to just go buy stuff for the goodies bags – time and energy are often in short supply. But this activity became an opportunity for me to spend quality time with my son. Perhaps when he is older he will remember us sitting together and making something. And that will make it time well spent.