How I Made My Sesame Street Party

 Hi there. It’s me, Noah. If you’re reading this, you’ve probably seen the pictures I posted of my 18th birthday party on Facebook, and wanted to know more about how it all came to be. Well, fear not, for in this blog I’ll detail everything that I did to turn my backyard into everyone’s favorite street. So sit back, relax, grab a cookie, and enjoy.

It started around May of this year, I was sitting around thinking of Sesame Street, and how my backyard kinda looks like Sesame Street, when suddenly, it hit me…

“(Gasps) I could turn my backyard into Sesame Street! Oh, wait a minute, but when? It wouldn’t make a lot of sense to just do it any random day. Oh right! My birthday is in four months! I can do it then! Aw right, but it’s on a Tuesday. Then, I’ll just do it on a Saturday! Yeah, that’s when I’ll do it!”

So, I told my parents about my idea, and they agreed. Though there was one slight issue, and that was we had to move out soon, luckily Dad was able to convince our landlord to extend our stay until the end of October.

So it was settled, my backyard was gonna become the world’s friendliest neighborhood. But I knew I couldn’t just jump into this willy nilly. Like our friends on Sesame Street have been saying recently, “You gotta plan the play, then play the plan.” And that’s just what I did.

The pictures you see below me are seven sketches I drew of what I wanted the place to look like.

As you can see, I modeled it after the current street set, for the simple reason that it was the easiest to render with the backyard I had.

There’s quite a lot of things going on in these sketches, and even more stuff was added as the months went by. So, I’m gonna go over each thing individually, and what I had to do to make them.

The first thing you’ll notice is I drew pictures of the main/most popular muppets of Sesame Street, and you might be thinking: “How, Noah? How can you bring these beloved Henson creations to the back of your house? You’ve never been to Sesame Workshop, your plushies are WAY too small, and as far as I know, you don’t have any puppet building supplies!”

And those are all true, but you may also notice the initials CC by each muppet name. And CC stands for Cardboard Cutout. That’s right! I was gonna make life-size cardboard versions of our favorite furry, felty and feathery friends to place all around the set. All I had to do was get actual cardboard to make it out of.

Now first of all, I couldn’t just use cardboard boxes, because those are already too formed to be of use. I needed flat sheets of cardboard that I could actually draw on.

Dad suggested that I make wood cutouts instead, but wood can cause splinters, which are painful, and the muppets were not made to cause pain. They were made to be soft, huggable, and easy to touch, and there’s no material more soft, huggable and easy to touch than cardboard, so I had to use it.

The problem was when I checked online, all the results were either too short or too expensive. We also checked some of our local hardware stores like Home Depot and Lowes, but neither of them had what we were looking for, either.

And that’s when I found out about the wonderful place, known as Box City.

At Box City they had both cardboard boxes AND cardboard sheets, which were exactly the sizes I needed them to be, and to top it all off, they were all sold for extremely affordable prices. So I got multiple medium size sheets and two super tall sheets. I’ll let you guess who I was gonna make with those ones.

So, after I finished outlining my cutouts with a pencil, and then going over those same outlines with a sharpie, the very next day, I went out to the garage, set up the paints I had bought, and I started painting. Then I used some scissors and Dad used a box cutter to cut them out. Here were my finished results.

And now for some notes:

• When I was cutting out Big Bird, I feel I really shouldn’t have cut off the cardboard surrounding the feathers on his top head, because pretty soon, they started drooping.
• I drew Oscar frowning, because, small tangent, on most of Oscar’s merchandise, he seems to be depicted smiling. Why? He’s a grouch. Grouches hate smiling. And I’m not saying SS merchandise should never show Oscar smiling, but I feel it happens way more than it should.
• I drew numbers on the Count’s cape, and just for fun, I put odd numbers on one side and even numbers on the other.
• I bought some paper clips to make a paper clip chain for Bert to hold, but that wasn’t the only thing I used them for.
• If you’re wondering why the blue Yip Yip’s eyes look so unsettling, it’s because I had a little malfunction with the paint.
• I didn’t have the right color green for Kermit’s collar, so that’s why it looks like he doesn’t have it.
• I managed to fit Elmo, Abby, Prairie Dawn, Kermit, Gonger, Dorothy and the martians all on one cardboard sheet, because they were so small.

So, now that I had the biggest part of my party set-up figured out, I had to figure out how to recreate the set.

First there was the iconic street sign and lamp post. For this I was originally gonna use more cardboard, but after building my cutouts, I decided to go for a different approach, I used green duct tape to make the poll, I cut a circle out of white cardstock paper to make the bulb, and as for the sign itself, I used yellow construction paper for the base, green construction paper for the inside, and used more white cardstock to cut out all the letters and numbers.

Next up was Big Bird’s nest, which was basically a cardboard box I stuck my cardboard Big Bird into, but I also added a few extra touches to bring it to life, which were:

One of the many barrels Big Bird has lying around.

His mailbox and the word that is totally one giant word, and not just the alphabet.

And the piece de resistance, Mr. Hooper’s portrait. A must-have for any Big Bird’s nest replica.

Then there was the 123 building. First, I drew the 123 sign to go on top of the sliding glass door that connects the kitchen to the backyard.

Next, I decided to use the window on the right side as Elmo’s apartment, but then I had an even better idea: I’d use it to make Elmo’s World instead. So, I used the one poster board I didn’t use to make a background for a wall (more on that later) and used it to draw Shade and part of the EW logo, then I used more construction paper to make the rest of the logo, and when it came time for my party, Elmo and Dorothy’s window was easily set up.

Now, here’s my personal favorite part, making Oscar’s trash area. Not only was this a lot of fun, but it was also super easy. I got the grey and blue trash bins we keep in our garage and wheeled them outside to the other side of the sliding glass door. Also, originally, I was gonna tape Oscar to the bin, but when I opened it, I discovered there was a slot that I could just stick him inside, so that worked out super well. Once the main grouch was put in place, I then taped paper versions of Slimey and Fluffy to the bin.

And here’s the best part: I had acquired a small copy of How To Be A Grouch at Barnes and Noble last year, which happened to come with a plastic talking Oscar button. So I taped said button to the top of the bin, and people could push it, and when they did, it would be like Oscar was talking directly to them.

Click here to see it in action

Next was Hooper’s Store. This was also fairly easy to set up, I remembered Dad had a canopy that he used on certain occasions, I asked him and he said I could use it. It was a little broken, but we managed. There was just one issue I noticed, and it was that the covering of the canopy was blue, and not green, like HS currently is. I asked dad if we could spray paint it green, but that he did not wanna go for. But then I remembered the exterior of Hooper’s was blue for a period of time, so I just taped the red signs I made to the top, and that was that.

For interior, we set up the three tables we had outside together, and for the big one, we taped our favorite two Monster Foodies to the end.

As for the rest of the set, my house wasn’t big enough to manually recreate all of it, so I decided to do the next best thing, and recreate it on a backdrop with poster boards my sister let me use. I would then put on the wall that keeps the street on the other side. For this backdrop I decided to not just draw the locations I couldn’t include, but also most of the other muppets and animated characters I couldn’t include as well. In fact, I have provided a list of which muppets I included and on which picture, which you can view by clicking this link below.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1W3SudjPopPSlVOnsXNADKF8baHAVUnTWtHw--F1XykA/edit?usp=sharing

But now that we’re on the subject, that brings me to an important thing I wanna discuss. When I was trying to stick my wall stuff to the wall, I originally used scotch tape, but it wasn’t working, because our walls were kinda dirty, but then dad had an epiphany. If we used duct tape and put glue on said duct tape, it might just be sticky enough to hold, and it was. It was so effective, I decided to use it for ALL of my drawings, including…

A helpful reminder for anyone who is the opposite of found.

A bunch of colored circles.

The most famous picnic of ladybugs.

The best pinball machine ever.

A little something reminiscent of the first season.

This message I made in Photoshop to hang on the front door.

Three memorable grocery items I stuck to the HS table.

A certain game our SS friends like to play.

A friendly greeting to go on the back of the gate.

This picture I made in art class a few weeks ago.

And this guest list I made to incorporate the many celebrities Sesame Street has featured over the years.

Next, I wanna talk about the two gallery sections I made.

First, there’s the group of pictures I put just outside of the entrance. These were inspired by the official branding Sesame Street featured for its 50th Anniversary.

As you’ll see, in addition to my recreation of original images, I made two new ones that are at the very bottom.

And last, but certainly not least, the Wall Of Humans.

As you can imagine, I really wanted to find a way to include the Sesame Street human cast in my party decor. But I knew I couldn’t make more cardboard cutouts, and I didn’t wanna put them on my backdrop, because I thought it would look too awkward, so I decided to do the other option: Make a gallery, featuring pictures of the best straightpeople in television history. And you'll notice, for each picture, I put the character's name, however many years they were on the show for, and the real name of their actors.

And before you start asking “Where’s David?” “Where’s Olivia?” “Where’s Buffy?” When I was choosing which cast members to include, I knew I wanted to draw the ones who were both A, not dead, and B, characters who I remember seeing the most on the show or currently on the show now. I also took some formatting inspiration from the wonderful Sesame Street mail stamps.

And yes, I did decide to put Jimmy in there, just because. :)

Okay, now that we’ve got the major decorations out of the way, we now have to go over, last minute decor, table decorations, and food.

As you may notice, I got quite a bit of stuff from Party City. (table cloths, stringy decorations, paper plates, napkins, noisemakers and a string of streamers) And I gotta tell ya, they deliver.

Next were these party hats I made myself. They come in 7 different varieties: Big Bird, Elmo, Cookie Monster, Oscar, Bert, Ernie and Kermit. (If you’re wondering why Ernie looks so different from the rest, his orange hat base was the only one I could find.)

I also added these small head pictures of Elmo, Big Bird, Ernie, Bert, Cookie Monster, Oscar and Grover to the other side of Hooper’s. And this time, I used scotch tape, but also still glued the backs of them.

Now food. First off, I made cupcakes with different colored frosting to represent Cookie Monster, Elmo, Abby and Big Bird. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find any red, blue or yellow frosting, but fortunately, we found food coloring, so it worked out.

And now for the other foods. For these, I used index cards to write different names for each food item, and I also put different Sesame Street figurines that my sister bought me at Target just for the occasion.

There were Cookie Monster’s Favorite Cookies, as to be expected.

The Count’s Counting Candy Delight. I put a bunch of assorted candies in a bowl, so people could count how many candies there were.

Ernie’s Special Bananas (Put them in your ear to keep the alligators away). If you get this reference, you’re a veteran.

Big Bird’s Big Brownies. Originally Big Burgers, but those come later.

Abby’s Special Fairy Tarts. Really just Pop-Tarts.

Elmo's Favorite Red Apples.

Super Grover’s Strawberries and Grapes. Yes, I did this because the initials were the same.

Rosita’s Hamburguesas y Perros Calientes. Hamburgers and Hot Dogs for all you uneducated folk.

And Gonger’s Monster Foodie Pizza. Which was a Costco Pizza, my Uncle Brandon didn’t get back with until 5:00 P.M.

And these last two things weren’t food, but they were still table items.

Bert's Paperclip Party Favors.

And finally, I put the kitchen trash can at the end of the tables, stuck my Oscar figure to it, and put up a sign that said: “Throw trash in here, then scram!”

Oh, and also, I took that big cooler we had in the garage to store some cool treats for everyone to have, and by cool treats, I mean popsicles and soda cans. (Pepsi and Fanta) And the thing I learned for this is that either coolers can’t keep popsicles frozen, or to keep popsicles frozen in a cooler, you need a LOT of ice.

And that’s pretty much everything I did to set my Sesame Street birthday party. I definitely think it’s one of the best ideas I’ve ever had, and between admiring all my hard work and seeing how happy it made other people, I'm glad I got to have this get together with some of my neighbors before we moved out.

I’d also like to say that this idea was largely inspired by this woman named Katie Fehlinger, who made her own Sesame Street party for her kids and made a YouTube video about it. You should totally check it out. She had a LOT of great ideas. I’ll link the video down below, so you can check it out, along with the rest of her channel.

Here you go.

And by the way, if you want me to explain something in more detail, just leave it in the comments or message me on Facebook, Instagram or DeviantArt, or you can email me at thomperfan@gmail.com.

Anyway, thanks for reading, and I’ll see you next time.