Charlie and the Chocolate Factory Birthday Bash--A Wonkalicious Party

Princess #4 turned 1 on her golden birthday last year. I was racking my brain on what to do for this important party. #1 is an important party in and of itself, but it being her golden birthday (which my older 3 kept bringing up and kept saying it had to be a really cool party because of that) I knew I had to deliver. Then it hit me--her name is Charlotte, and we sometimes call her Charlie. Why not a Charlie and the Chocolate Factory Party to celebrate her Golden Birthday?

I got right to work finding these chocolate candy bar wrappers online, then making a golden ticket invitation to put inside all of the chocolate bars to give out to all of our guests to invite them to her special day.

I found some fun, shimmery gold paper to print them off on. The trickiest part to the invitation was getting them delivered to everyone without them melting in the hot Texas June weather!

I heard from numerous friends that the invitation was a total smashing hit with their kids. Some even thought they really got to go to Wonka's chocolate factory like on the movie. Sorry to disappoint you kids, but you just get to come to my house. We'll have fun though, I promise!

I think why my kids were so excited for this theme for their baby sister's party is because they knew that there must be lots of candy if it really is going to be a Willy Wonka party. And oh boy were they right. It started off with the birthday cake. 

I iced it in a Wonka purple buttercream, added chocolate ganache drips like the chocolate river dripping down the cake, and topped it with all sorts of yummy things--chocolate candy bars, lollipops, and smarties to name a few.

Just looking at the cake could send someone into a sugar coma!

The fun didn't stop there. I made these cute little edible teacups out of sugar cones, cookies, and pretzels. Just soak the end of the cone in water for a few seconds, then carefully cut that part away. Use a little melted chocolate to glue the cone to the cookie (and fill in the cookie's hole if it has one, like mine did). then glue a piece of a rounded pretzel to the side for the handle. I filled the cups with a homemade chocolate mousse. These were probably the biggest hit out of all the food, at least for the adults (candy was still probably the favorite for the kids).

Of course if you are having a Willy Wonka party, you've gotta have some Fizzy Lifting Drink! No kids flew away though!

I found these fun papers covered in edible sugar dots at the craft store. It was perfect for our lickable wallpaper.

A Dum-dum tree planted in a bed of everlasting gobstoppers does sound delicious. I wish that tree really grew in my backyard! There were also several other jars filled with different kinds of candy and chocolate treats. Yum!

Since it was her first birthday, we needed a smash cake for her to have to herself. I made a little golden ticket for her, with gold edible luster dust sprinkled over the yellow buttercream.

I also found a Wonka bar wrapper made for mini candy bars. This was a great project for older sisters to help with!

I love decorations, and these ones were so fun to do! The lollipops were made out of pool noodles and duct tape, then wrapped in cellophane. There is a great tutorial for them here. The hard candies that were hung from the ceiling were simply colorful chinese lanterns that were wrapped in cellophane. And a golden ticket sign finished off our background.

A sign on the front door welcomed our guests to our Charlie's Chocolate Factory.

We had a few activities for the kids to do while the adults all visited. I made these photo booth props for kids and adults to take their picture in, using our Wonkavision television. Are you a good egg or a bad egg?

We also tied Violet Beauregarde blueberry balloons to each kid's ankle and they tried to smash each other's blueberry, without getting their own blueberry smashed. Some of those kids were ruthless trying to smash each other's blueberries!

The cake smash was a great way to end our party--and after all that sugar this little one was ready to have very sweet dreams, and we were very ready to send those sugar filled kids home with their parents 😉

It was a special Golden Birthday for this cute one  year old! So fun to celebrate Charlie's birthday at our very own Chocolate Factory! (and yes, I dressed her in orange in honor of the oompa loompas, whose help made this whole party possible 😉 )