Homemade Birthday Party Gifts/Holiday Craft

Looking for a project to do with the kids this Christmas break?  Make crayons and a coloring book!  My daughter and I had fun making the parting gifts for her friends at her birthday party. This is easy and fun project to do together.  The kids love helping and are thrilled with the end product. Best of all the project cost next to nothing to make.
We gathered all the old crayons in the house, I had no idea that we had so many.  Keep the old and broken crayons.  Next we peeled off the paper and broke them into pieces. Then we put the broken crayons into similar color piles.  We then filled mini muffin tins half full of the broken crayons.
Preheat the oven to 200F.  Bake the crayons until melted, keep a close eye on them. Careful when taking them out of the oven, as the crayons are a hot liquid and can easily burn.  Let the mixture cool until solid before you flip the muffin tin.  There you have it, a set of swirl crayons.
The coloring book was a collection of free printable coloring pages.  Google free printable coloring pages and the topic, ours was tea party.  Then have the front cover decorated by your budding artist, add a back and string together.  Now you have a custom made coloring book to go with the swirl crayons. All kids loved them and we did as well...... She had a great time making the present, I had a great time with her, and it was budget friendly!!!!

Birthday Tea Party-She turned Five

Birthday Girl

So she is officially 5 years old and loving it.  The party was a success and not as stressful as birthday parties in the past.  This was a first for me.  When I asked her what type of party she wanted, there was no hesitation. An English Tea Party was the first and only idea she had.










So that was it, the next part was to see how many kids we would invite.  We decided that a sit down tea party would be best and to use my vintage china (my past thrift store finds).  At that point, I decided we could have a total of eight girls, my daughter and seven friends.

Waiting for the guests

Are they here yet?

We started our party preparations with the invitations.  I found a large selection of free printable birthday party invitations online.  She picked out her favorite and we printed them out.  The next day she handed them out to her friends.  You can find free invitations by googling, free printable birthday invitations.  This is a great way to save money!

My daughter and I had fun making the party gifts for her friends.  She wanted to have a coloring book based on the tea theme.  So I went and searched google for free printable coloring pages and made a coloring book.  We also made crayons to go with.  For me this was so much fun to do with her and she was proud of the gifts she made for her friends.   She also handed out thank you pictures to her friends.

For her guests

Her beautiful flowers

I then chose to host the party at home and use my vintage china and ribbons for the table.  This was to keep costs down and gave the party a more personalized feel.  The only thing we bought were flowers for the table, and with great luck they were on sale.  She kept them later and smelled them daily.

Vintage style

The menu was kept simple and kid friendly.  I made mini fruit kabobs (berries on a toothpick), for a healthy treat and to add color to the table.  I then made mini open faced turkey and cheese sandwiches and closed egg salad sandwiches.  Individual dried cherry and cranberry fruit cups were next to each place setting.  Then for sweets we served mini lemon poppy seed scones.

Finally, instead of a cake, I made a tower of birthday cupcakes with piped pastel frosting flowers.

When we asked her what she wanted for her birthday from mom and dad, she decided on an "experience," instead of a present.  Wow, how grown up.  So my husband suggested a face painter come to the party as the "experience".  The neighborhood had hired a lady to do face painting for the 4th of July event.  My daughter had loved it and we were impressed at the quality of work.  The hardest part was keeping it a surprise.

When my husband told her she was sooooo happy.  The face painter was a big hit at the party.  My daughter loved it and so did her friends. (I will write a blog about the wonderful face painter.)

The table was beautiful and the party was fantastic.  My daughter said she felt so elegant, like a princess.  This is when she melted our heart.  There is simply nothing sweeter.  This was such a fun party to plan and we are already thinking of next years!