For better or for worse, I’ve become addicted to themed extravaganzas that leave me both exhilarated and utterly drained. When Lily turned seven, she wanted a Frozen birthday party – and as a lover of the movies myself, I couldn’t have been more excited.
This party was also the first I threw after FINALLY getting my hands on a Cricut Maker 3, and I went wild with it. The result was, in my humble opinion, quite magical – as if I’d found my own inner Elsa in the process.
You’re probably browsing for ideas for your kid’s own glittery Frozen-themed party. You want a party that’s magical for your kiddo, but also manageable for you. Maybe you like to get creative but without the Pinterest-perfect pressure.
Please remember that I am a self-employed mom working from home, and a big part of my job is to DIY events like this and post them here for your inspiration! I start my party projects about two months ahead of time and have lots of time each week to work on them, which is not feasible for everyone. So take the ideas that seem doable to you without feeling obligated to do all the things.
Let’s dive into the Frozen birthday party that thawed even the frostiest of hearts and emerged as an epic celebration – with enough tips and tricks to keep the meltdowns at bay (and I mean yours).
This post may contain affiliate links. If you make a purchase after clicking one, I may receive a small commission at no cost to you.
The Invitations
I pride myself on always designing my kids’ party invitations in Photoshop. (The skill needs to be put to good use somehow!)
I’m really proud of this one because I couldn’t find a ready-made background image that looked the way I wanted, so I pieced together every bit and edited the colors the way I wanted. The glittery frame around the info makes it feel extra icy!
Prints were ordered from Mpix and sent to friends and family via snail mail.
Decorations & Aesthetic
Color Scheme
While I didn’t want to limit my ideas to the second Frozen movie, its vibe did dominate the party. I love purple which is heavily leaned on in the second film, so it was featured prominently. (Don’t worry, Lily lived out her pink princess dreams at her previous Sleeping Beauty birthday party.)
Blue and white were also the main colors, of course. But Frozen 2 takes place in the fall, and swirling colorful leaves are featured throughout the film (even taking on the name “Samantha,” courtesy of Olaf).
The buffet server and basement table had pretty purple plastic covers on them. For the main kitchen table, though, I found this gorgeous iridescent table cover at Walmart that I have zero regrets about spending a few extra dollars on. It was super thick and felt amazing!
The plates and drink cups were icy teal to contrast against the table covers. I bought Frozen 2-themed napkins instead of a solid color, but if I hadn’t found them, I would’ve gotten deep pink napkins to match the leaves on the birch trees (which you’ll see below).
Sidewalk Chalk Snowflakes
There were many parties before this one where I’d intended to draw something in sidewalk chalk, but never had the time to do it. This time I finally perfected my planning timeline, so I could go out and draw some blue snowflakes!
Chalkboard Welcome Sign (and Exit Sign)
As you can see from that drawing of an alleged Elsa above, I am not the best artist. But that’s okay! I always do my best, and it either comes out impressive or it gives everyone a good laugh.
Anyway, I drew Elsa in dustless chalk on my easel chalkboard. I riffed on the song “Into the Unknown” to invite guests into the house!
On the other side, as guests were leaving, they saw Olaf with some hilarious lyrics from his insightful song! (I thought this drawing was quite a bit better.)
Front Door Sign
I couldn’t resist designing and printing a cute little sign for the front door based on the amazing “Show Yourself” song from Frozen 2! It only took a few minutes. I printed it on cardstock and taped it to the door’s glass.
Photo Spot
By the time I was done hanging my DIY decorations, there wasn’t a great spot left for the scene setter I bought. (Well, there was plenty of wall space in the basement, but none of my adult family members would go down there to snap selfies.)
So I just used packing tape to stick it to the bricks by the front door! That way everyone could take a few photos of themselves either on the way in or as they were leaving.
Entry Impact
This was the first thing guests saw as they entered the front door. Nokk (Elsa’s water horse) was DIY from blue glitter cardstock (specifically, “Ocean Blue” from Michael’s)!
I found his silhouette online, sliced it into cardstock-sized pieces in Design Space, and used my Cricut to cut it all out. Simple tape on the back held all the pieces together, then he was hung on the wall with loops of the same tape!
We had purple, silver, and icy blue helium balloons floating throughout the house.
The cabinet below Nokk is where I usually put party favors and small activities for the kids. With so much of the party about Elsa and Anna, I wanted to spotlight one of Kristoff’s famous lyrics on my letter board.
My daughter already had a plush Olaf and a walking plush Bruni (the fire salamander) to help decorate the space.
In addition to balloons, I had various small glass vases (leftovers from Lily’s Beauty and the Beast birthday party) filled with blue and white glass gems to hold fall leaf floral picks I found on sale!
The two different bags are a snowman-building activity and regular party favor knick-knacks for the kids.
But I can’t forget the water bottles! I made custom “Melted Snowmen” labels (featuring a distraught Olaf) to print and tape on them.
Birthday Banner, Leaves, & Balloons
I don’t put a lot of decorations around the living room to ensure guests have plenty of space to sit and stretch out. But the mantle is ALWAYS decorated!
Josh filled these Frozen balloons with helium to float above the TV. I placed one of the fall leaf vases on the mantle along with lots of faux fall leaves. A premade Frozen 2 birthday banner hung underneath.
The Kitchen, a.k.a. The Gathering Spot
The kitchen gets the bulk of the decor, as everyone spends a lot of time in it throughout the party! The main table gets dressed up, as well as the server (for the food buffet) and the wall space above it.
Inspired by Kristoff’s foray into the woods, I made my own paper birch trees to tape up as the backdrop! It was super easy.
I cut three lengths of 24-inch white craft paper long enough to cover from the ceiling to just below the server’s top, then freely cut them into “trees” (meaning I purposefully didn’t cut them in straight lines, and they’re all different widths).
With the trees lying across another length of paper to catch the overflow, I painted the edges of the trees from the outside in with black acrylic paint, allowing the tip of the brush to “flick” inward for jagged shadows.
Once the edges were all painted, I dipped the edge of a piece of cardboard in black paint and scraped it back and forth across the trees horizontally to create the look of the bark.
The black branches and deep pink and orange fall leaves were cut out of cardstock using my Cricut!
The kitchen table had the gorgeous iridescent table cover, the Olaf cake, and the cupcake stand, with a vase of fall leaves in between. Faux fall leaves were scattered around everything.
(By the way, my daughter’s birthday is near the end of August – in the blazing heat. Don’t be afraid to use a seasonal theme at ANY time of the year!)
In honor of Elsa’s ice magic, I hung glittery snowflakes all over the ceiling.
Basement Table
While most of our family is unable (or at least unwilling) to go downstairs to eat or engage in activities, the kids love playing down there at different intervals of the party. My husband (and some select family members) also enjoy being down there where it’s cooler and quieter – it gives them a break from sensory overload.
So I usually set up a nice little table that matches the upstairs decor, but I don’t usually worry about decorating the whole area.
Lily’s Dress
Elsa has some seriously great new outfits in Frozen 2, so I let Lily choose the one she liked the best as one of her birthday presents.
She chose this beautiful “Show Yourself” dress with beading, tulle sleeves and skirt, and a detachable tulle cape. After wearing it for the whole party, she wore it again when we attended Olaf’s Royal Picnic on the Disney Wish!
Food & Drinks & Puns, Oh My
The content of the Frozen movies made it far, far too easy to come up with excellent foods based on puns.
- Norwegian Meatballs: Were these actually Norwegian? Nope. In fact, they were the frozen Italian-style meatballs from Walmart. But we can pretend they were Norwegian for the sake of the theme.
- Anna’s Sandwiches: The new queen of Arendelle apparently likes sandwiches almost as much as she likes chocolate. I mean, she sang about them with Hans in the first movie.
- Snow Flurries: White cheddar puffcorn! This is one of my favorite snacks, and the kids love it too.
- Frozen Hearts: As a callback to the first movie, I dipped strawberries in melted white chocolate. I left the greens on for dipping, then pulled them off afterward to help them resemble hearts.
- Snowman Noses: Olaf’s always losing his nose! To reduce the spread of germs, I pre-filled small plastic cups with ranch dressing and tucked the baby carrots into them for a grab-and-go dish.
- Olaf String Cheeses: Mozzarella string cheese sticks are a great backdrop for a snowman stick. I used black and orange Sharpies to draw Olaf’s features onto the plastic wrappers!
- Olaf’s Arms: Pretzels. It’s just a bowl of pretzel sticks. But it was cute!
- Elsa’s Ice Crystals: In my usual effort to incorporate one sweet item on the food buffet (other than the traditional cake and ice cream), I put blue rock candy sticks in a mason jar for guests to easily grab. It’s hard to tell in the picture, but they were individually shrink-wrapped so everyone could take them home if they preferred!
- Kristoff’s Ice: I always have a bucket of ice next to the drink station, but this is the one and only time I ever gave it a label!
- Ahtohallan River Water: The name, paired with the murky brown liquid, makes this seem a little gross, haha. But it was delicious! I just mixed 2 quarts of white grape juice, a 2-liter of Sprite, and a 2-liter of ginger ale.
- Liquid Ice Magic: The color of this punch came out PERFECT, and it was so yummy! It contains a gallon of blue Hawaiian Punch, a 2-liter of Sprite, 2 cups of pineapple juice, and, of course, plenty of floating ice directly in the dispenser. (It was consumed so quickly it didn’t have a chance to get watered down!)
We also had a jug of sweet tea (because, Kentucky) and the previously mentioned bottles of water.
DIY Games (Plus One Store-Bought)
Snowman-Building Kits
I learned the hard way that marshmallows go stale quickly once they’re out of the bag they came in! Fortunately, for this activity, they weren’t necessarily meant to be consumed.
Everyone was given a bag of supplies to build their own (theoretically) edible snowman! Each bag contained large marshmallows, mini marshmallows, pretzel sticks, candy corn, candy eyes, and mini chocolate chips.
There were some… interesting creations. The kids had a blast!
Pin the Nose on Olaf
I used my Cricut to make my own Olaf version of the classic donkey party game.
He looks so weird without a nose, right?!
Fortunately, my daughter managed to stick a carrot in the exact right spot. (Reader, I did not want to assume she cheated, and it took me two additional years to realize she could see THROUGH the black blindfold.)
Olaf Bean Bag Toss
This DIY game was inaugurated at my son’s dinosaur birthday party. For this party, I rolled the whole board with white paint, then freehanded Olaf on top of that with acrylic paints.
It was a wonderfully warm day, so we set the board up with mini bean bags outside.
Pinata
Another classic party game, a pinata ensures EVERY kid goes home with some goodies. Luckily, this was one pinata I was able to get at my local Walmart!
Since it’s usually hot on Lily’s birthday, I try to avoid chocolate and fill the pinata with fruit chews and hard candies.
The Great Olaf Cake Disaster (and Gorgeous Cupcakes)
Homemade Olaf Cake
Lily didn’t really care what her cake looked like, but she knew she wanted Olaf. And I had a vision for it! I wanted him to sit on the cake board, holding his head up in the air with his arms made of branches.
This cake wasn’t my first rodeo, so I even did some figuring on the physics required to pull it off.
Unfortunately, my lack of experience kicked me in the butt, and I ended up with this.
I just couldn’t get his head to safely stand up on two dowels (for two arms). And I didn’t want to use extra dowels and ruin the illusion I had in mind.
It turns out, a large Olaf head made of Cocoa Krispie treats gets pretty heavy.
But Olaf is always falling apart, right? So I worked with what I had. I made his arms strictly with fondant instead of rolling dowels up in them, and I gave his head its very own cake board.
That carrot nose is 100% orange fondant, too!
And guess what? Everyone thought the cake was super cute and had no idea I’d messed it up.
Frozen Cupcakes
Would the Olaf cake have been enough to feed our guests? Yep! But I saw an idea for these gorgeous cupcakes, and I had to make them.
They’re simple vanilla cupcakes in white wrappers with homemade buttercream icing (I use Wilton’s recipe) colored icy blue. I found the perfect sprinkles and got edible rice paper fall leaves to stick in the frosting!
Simple Party Favors
I put a lot of energy into the cake and decorations for this party, so I went with traditional party favors: temporary tattoos, stickers, and small toys. I did make custom favor tags to tape to the zippered snack bags, though.
They say “Thanks for CHILLING at Lily’s Party!”
So there you have it! With a little planning and these ideas, you can throw a Frozen birthday bash that will leave your child breathless (from excitement, not exertion) and you with enough sanity to, well, let it go.
Remember, the most important ingredient is love (and maybe frosting). Now start your Google Doc and get party planning like a true queen (or king)!
