Everything you see in this party, except for the cake (which was dirt cheap) and the candy, was either free from a dumpster (true, read on), or 5 dollars or less. Most things seen in this post were three dollars or less. Come join me on a cavity fun filled adventure!

I talk about some of these individual decor pieces down below, but let me just talk about the rainbow swirl candies here. I bought a 3 dollar pack of dessert party plates from Target and wrapped them in cellophane to make 8 different rainbow striped treats that I used in different ways for this party. Some were taped to the wall….that’s right….taped….just directly on the wall because I hear packing tape is good for paint. The remaining ones I turned into a garland. Wee doggies.

There are the plates I made into a garland. I cut circles out of card-stock from an old garland to add between each plate. Put it on a ribbon and ya done!

TIP: Buy a solid color store bought cake and decorate it at home. This cake was a big size and only 15 dollars from Sam’s. I decorated this one with a sprinkle number topper from Hobby Lobby, candles from Five Below, and candy from the Dollar Tree! It was a twelve inch cake and all in cost me 22 bucks! This is an example of being a winner.

PSA: You can always hot glue anything. This includes large swirly suckers that you drop and break.

Might as well turn the homeschool chalkboard into something.

I know, I know, the balloon backdrop looks so small here. In reality, it was fine, Karen. Moving on, I hand cut a dollar store tablecloth into drips, which coordinated with her invitations that I bought on here on Etsy. If you’ve been around here a few years, you may remember the first time I came up with drip cloths for my third daughter’s chocolate themed birthday party. They are satisfying

I bought plain white paper boxes from Hobby Lobby and decorated them with large patterned letters in each child’s first initial. My daughter decorated each box with puffy sweets stickers.

Buckle up kitty cats because those swirly little fans are straight from a dumpster at Five Below. Yes sir! My mom dumpster dives in retail dumpsters and you wouldn’t believe what they throw out. She found these fans and other party supplies and I’ve kept them in a tote knowing I’d use them one day. Two hours before the party, I thought they would look like suckers on spray painted dowels, so that’s exactly what I did! I added ribbon and that, my friends, is how you turn dumpster finds into basically free party supplies!

The bigger suckers and the wrapped candies in the picture below is just one dollar pool noodles wrapped in athletic tape and sealed with cellophane. For the big suckers, I hot glued them on craft dowels I painted and for the individual candies, I just wrapped the rolled up noodle, and twisted up the ends of the cellophane and tied them tight to make them look like over-sized candies. The handing honeycomb ice creams were one dollar from the Dollar Tree for a two pack. Pimpin’. I hung them and opened them halfway and secured them to the balloon wall for a dimensional look.

They filled them nicely, bro.

So boat loads of candy can get expensive. We found the world’s cutest marshmallows from Walmart for 2 dollars a bag. They were just vanilla flavored marshmallows in cupcake shape with sprinkled sugar on them. They were so cute, cheap, and took up a bunch of space. I also used brownie bites from Sam’s Club that were manna from heaven! I’m not supposed to eat gluten, but I partookth.

Aw yeah, donkey butt, that is one of those cute glass jar gumball containers from the Target cheap zone that sold out super fast. I know a sell out when I see them so I bought one and I sprayed painted the red on the jar yellow to match the table. I bought many of these plastic display containers from Hobby Lobby and they were cracked so instead of 6-7 dollars, I got them for $1.50! When filled with candy, you couldn’t even tell and imma keep usin’ those bad boys until they fall apart or the good Lord comes back, one.

You are darn tootin’ that I used mini boxes of cereal! The mini box backs are cheap and cereal is truly the ultimate of trash foods. Everybody loves cereal AND they take up lots of space!

For the sucker display, Styrofoam can puzzlingly enough, be costly so I bought two circle discs of Styrofoam from the Dollar Tree, stacked them in this container, and stuck carnival suckers in them. It gave some variance to the look of the display and was cheaper than….something witty….cheaper than……I don’t know, Sarah.

Another big table filler: Cotton candy containers from Sam’s! It was really cheap, really. It’s way cheaper than buying smaller candies, like Skittles, that don’t take up much space.

I love coming up with neat ways to give a gift card and I made this large clear candy ball with an ornament and twisted and glued cellophane hot glued to each end. I got confetti from the Dollar Tree and cut it up to use as a filler. I mean, I love these like chocolate cake after midnight in my pajamas.This gift card was the prize for the ice card scratch off games. I found the scratch offs in the “dollar” aisle at Target a few years ago and bought a few packs to use at different parties. The ice creams went perfect with the theme. Here are the scratch-offs below. I love adding a gambling flair to elementary school parties. It just feels so right.

And the winner was…..Mrs. Emie!

I did this whole party for 12 kids for 100 bucks! That includes EVERYTHING! It was simple and fun. 5 stars. Highly recommend.

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