Splish Splash! Rubber Ducky Party Ideas

The classic rubber ducky makes a darling first birthday party theme for 1-year-olds! Looking for some ducky fun? Check below:

Purchase rubber ducky party supplies from Birthday in a Box to bring your party plan together. (These also work well for a rubber ducky-themed baby shower!)

If you are planning on hand delivering your invitations, give your guests little rubber duckies with a tags attached that provide all of your party details. You can also write this information directly on the rubber duckies.

Another idea would be to cut rubber ducky-shaped cards out of yellow construction paper, and write all of the party details on them.

A personalized rubber ducky invitaiton would also be a delight to send to your guests.

Your party decorations can be any colors that you like, but yellow most certainly should be one of them. You may also want to use blue and white (for water). Buy balloons and streamers in your color scheme and hang them all over the party area. You could also buy a rubber ducky Mylar balloon for the birthday kid’s special seat!

Set the table in your chosen colors (and don’t be afraid to mix and match themed patterns with solids), and mix them up. For instance, you could have a blue tablecloth and yellow plates. I would place rubber duckies all over the table as well. If you have one large rubber ducky, place it in the middle, and tie two or three balloons to the ducky for added festivity.

Other decoration ideas: dip a duck-shaped sponge (buy one or make one) in paint, and stamp it all over pieces of poster board. Or, if you are having older kids attend, they can use the stamps and paint to create a large birthday card for your kid as a fun activity.

Cut large rubber duckies out of yellow construction paper, and hang them from the ceiling for a fun additional decoration. You can also place signs out in your front yard that say “Duck Crossing,” and have a path of duck foot prints leading up to your front door for party entryway decor.

If it is a nice day, have your party outdoors and fill a kiddie pool with with water and rubber duckies. The kids can, of course, play in the pool, and if you have a lot of rubber duckies floating in the water you can write numbers on the bottom of them and have each child choose one. The kids will receive prizes that correlate to the number on the bottom of their duck. This is easy, and everyone wins. If your party is indoors, you can still inflate a pool and fill it with rubber duckies or bouncing balls in your color scheme for the kids to enjoy.

You can also buy a bubble machine and have it blowing bubbles at the front entryway of the party for everyone to walk through. You can move the bubble machine around as needed. You could also hang a plain shower curtain at the front entrance that the guests must pass through to get into the party area. This would be fun.

Make sure to have party music playing, such as the “Rubber Ducky” theme from Sesame Street and “Splish Splash, I was taking a Bath.” This will get your guests in rubber ducky mood.

If older kids are attending, have them do a craft. They can make rubber ducky hats or rubber ducky puppets. For the hats, provide the kids with plain sun visors and have them use googly eyes, markers, and stickers to create their ducks. For the puppets, give the kids yellow or orange socks and googly eyes, foam beaks, and feathers for decoration.

Have the kids make Play-Doh rubber duckies out of a mound of yellow dough. Also have a few additional colors, such as orange and red.

For games, break open a rubber ducky piñata! Also have a duck hunt, where the kids hunt for rubber duckies you have hidden all over the party area.

Play Rubber, Rubber, Ducky as you would Duck, Duck, Goose. Also play Pin the Bill on the Ducky.

If you have a kiddie pool filled with water, have the little ones toss duckies into the pool. If the kids are a bit older, have them try to toss rings around the duckies in the pool.

For the food , buy a rubber ducky cookie cutter, and cut all of the food out in this shape. You can make rubber ducky sandwiches, sugar cookies (the kids can decorate these!), and Jell-O Jigglers. You could also serve little dry cereal snacks and call them “duck feed.” Put the duck feed into little silver buckets, and have the kids can eat it out of these little pails.

Lemonade would be a great drink for this party. You could also make a punch with sprite, cherry Kool-Aid, and a few scoops of lime sherbet. Have some clean rubber duckies floating in the punch bowl as well.

FamilyFun.com has a great just ducky tub cake.

For favors, send the kids home with little plastic pails filled with bath time fun: little bath bubbles, bath confetti, miniature washcloths that expand with water, little bars of soap, bottles of bubbles, small rubber duckies, etc. For babies, fill a sippy cup with a healthy cereal and decorate it with rubber duckies. A soft rubber ducky bath toy would also be great.

Thanks to Tracy for the delicious ducky cake (above).