When my son was about to turn 13 and become an official teen, I asked him what he wanted for his birthday. All he wanted was a rubber chicken. And that was it.
The grandparents asked about what to get him. I told him he simply just wanted a rubber chicken. Then a seed was planted in me. I decided to make his whole birthday a rubber chicken theme. What could be more fun than that?
I went to Pinterest to get some ideas. There were quite a few cakes out there already. I guess this wasn’t such a new idea after all.
Since we were still in the middle of a pandemic, and the vaccine wasn’t available to children yet, we made the party really small. Just our immediate family. But I still wanted it to be fun and special. And memorable. I brought out the silhouette cutting machine and made rubber chicken cut-outs. Thirteen of them, one for each year. Then on each chicken we wrote what we appreciated about him. I guess you could call them chicken affirmations. I then taped it to the wall above his computer, where he was sure to see it.
Then I designed a rubber chicken greeting card and pattern gift wrap.
Then the day finally came. Little did kiddo know what was in store. He saw the rubber chickens on the wall and read the affirmations. Then we presented him with his gifts and he opened them one by one. It was just as he asked. A rubber chicken.
Of course the grandparents weren’t content to buy just a chicken. They searched Amazon to find other theme-related gifts. They found a toss game, playing cards, and even a t-shirt. Who knew that a yellow dog toy could be so popular? We couldn’t stop laughing and smiling. Kiddo was mildly amused.
Then for the cake, i was going to also bake something to go along with the theme. But kiddo requested his favorite – the Oreo cheesecake from The Cheesecake Factory. Who can say no to that? Off we went to get a slice of his favorite cake.
Overall it was a really fun day! The unusual birthday theme brightened everyone’s day. It was just what we needed to distract us from the craziness of the pandemic.
Of course this theme is not only good for pandemic times, its a fun theme that everyone will enjoy. If you’re looking for something unique for kids both young and old, this is it. I could see this used for other occasions too. As I write this, I’m envisioning a teacher putting these all over their classroom.
If you’d like to make your own rubber chicken cut-outs, i’m happy to share the images i used to create them. The easiest approach is to use a cutting machine such as a Cricut or Silhouette. If you don’t have either, you can always trace and cut by hand.
i recommend using colored paper. I used the Astrobright copy paper, i picked up a multi-colored pack from Office Depot. Construction paper would work just as well. Then i used googly eyes, you can get those at any craft store.
Just right click on these images to save them to your computer. You can resize them with the software that comes with your cutting machine. Or with an image editing software such as Photoahop.
Please note these images are for personal or educational use only.
Any questions or comments? Chime in below. Enjoy and have fun with it!
