$50 Oriental Trading Gift Card #Giveaway - Ends 6/11

As you probably already know I'm a big fan of Oriental Trading. I've partnered with them several times over the years to feature some really cool projects and products. Today I’m super excited to be teaming up with them for a great giveaway! One lucky reader will win a Oriental Trading  $50 gift card!

Now's your chance to do some fun crafting projects of your own! Or if you're not a crafter maybe pick up some party supplies for this summer. Simply enter the giveaway below for your chance to win a $50 gift card to go on your own Oriental Trading shopping spree. Not sure what to make? Just check out my previous Oriental Trading posts for some inspiration.

This giveaway is eligible for U.S residents 18 and older and runs through June 11th.  The winner will be randomly drawn and contacted by Oriental Trading after the contest ends.

$50 Oriental Trading Gift Card Giveaway
This blog is not responsible for drawing or fulfilling the winner's prize. Prize will be fulfilled by Oriental Trading, please allow up to one week for prize delivery.

The Year of the Dog Themed Birthday Party

If you don't already know this year is the Year of the Dog for the Chinese Zodiac New Year. The only reason I know this is because my daughter will be 12 this year so it was the Year of the Dog when she was born. Oh and because she told me all about it. She decided that this year is a special birthday since she will be turning 12 and her Chinese Zodiac from when she was born has made it's way back around. If you didn't know they rotate every 12 years. I'll admit I had no idea until she filled me in with her pitch about her Year of the Dog Chinese Zodiac themed birthday party. So after talking with her dad we decided that if she had educated herself that much on something without any prompting than she deserved a birthday party for it. And thus began the quest to find things for her party.

If you've ever searched for Chinese Zodiac party supplies you know there are actually quite a few out there. Some are very specific to the theme too, like these cute treat bags I found on the Oriental Trading website. They are super cute and will be great for holding all of the other dog themed goodies I found. They also match a bunch of other party supplies on their website. Besides the specific supplies we also did some general "dog" themed things too. We decided to do some stuffed plush mini-dogs, Squishy dogs (since they are so popular right now), and some DIY ceramic dog banks (great for birthday party crafting). Oh and of course lots of fortune cookies! I mean what Chinese New Year themed party would be complete without some fortune cookies. We already taste tested a few of them so I can confirm that they are just as good as the ones you get with your Chinese take-out orders.

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Disclosure: This is a sponsored post on behalf of the above mentioned brand. I received product(s) in exchange for my honest and unbiased thoughts. All thoughts and opinions stated are my own and are in no way influenced by my partnership with mentioned brands.

Advent or 12 Days of Christmas?

Some people are firm believers in celebrating the advent every year in December. While others are firmly against it. I for one like to celebrate the advent with my family, but with all the hustle and bustle going on we don't always remember to start on time, and don't always remember every single day along the way. Life is just so full and busy this time of year. To help relieve some of that stress we came up with a back-up plan. If we don't start the advent on time we start our 12 Days of Christmas celebrating instead. We start it whenever we realize we missed being able to fully celebrate the advent, and then move through the 12 days as we remember to do it - in other words not always 12 days in a row. However we always end the last day on Christmas Eve. This is just how we like to end our celebration in preparation for Christmas Day.

Each year we prepare a little something different for our 12 days of Christmas. This year we decided to do some fun drawstring bags with goodies inside of them. We are going to paint the numbers 1-12 on them so we know which day we are on and how many we have left. Using some super cute colored clothes pins I am able to hang the little bags from the picket fence pieces that we are going to also paint. Day 1 is actually going to be celebrated with the kids doing all of the painting, and mom and dad filling the bags. Each bag will have two small items for the kids (like squishy emoji's and bubble tape) so they both get the same thing to avoid arguments. And the last day will be filled with something extra special for the whole family to enjoy. I'm thinking maybe movie tickets or something we can do over Christmas break this year.

How about you? Do you have a special way you celebrate the Advent and/or 12 days of Christmas?
You can find lots of fun ways to celebrate the Advent and 12 days of Christmas on the Oriental Trading website. All products featured in this post are from Oriental Trading.

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Disclosure: This is a sponsored post on behalf of the above mentioned brand. I received monetary compensation or product(s) in exchange for my honest and unbiased thoughts. All thoughts and opinions stated are my own and are in no way influenced by my partnership with mentioned brands.

Christmas Traditions & Legends

Every year we do things around Christmas time that many would call traditions. And some traditions stem from legends started way before we were even born. You know like hanging mistletoe in a doorway so you can meet your sweetie there for a kiss. :-)

One of my all time favorite Christmas legends is leaving milk and cookies out for Santa - even though we all know he's not the one really eating them. I guess in some ways we are rewarding ourselves for all of our hard work during the holidays. Every year I make up little goodie bags for my daughter's teachers. And this year I decided to do them with a Christmas Legends theme. Instead of trying to make cookies from scratch and give them a glass of milk I opted for pre-packaged cookies, and little milk bottles filled with white packaged mints to look like the milk. This way I can prepare them ahead of time and not worry anything will spoil. I also found some milk and cookies ornaments that are super cute, and explain the legend of milk and cookies for those that might not know it.

Another fun tradition of ours that is also stemmed from a legend is hanging candy canes on the tree. I'm sure many don't even know there is a story behind the candy cane. My kids however know the story and take pride in it when we are decorating the tree with those red and white swirled candy J's. I've forgotten to pick up candy canes before, and even bought the wrong color (as I was told) and let me tell you it was not a good thing come decorating time. My kids are pretty particular about this tradition, and I'm okay with that.

How about you? Do you have any traditions/legends you celebrate with your family over the holidays?

You can find lots of fun (and some new) ways to celebrate traditions on the Oriental Trading website.

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Disclosure: This is a sponsored post on behalf of the above mentioned brand. I received monetary compensation or product(s) in exchange for my honest and unbiased thoughts. All thoughts and opinions stated are my own and are in no way influenced by my partnership with mentioned brands.

Giving Thanks on Thanksgiving

When I think about Thanksgiving I immediately think about giving thanks for everything I have to be grateful for over the past year. In our household we have always had a tradition of each of us telling everyone the one thing they are most thankful for from the past year. It's always neat to see what the kids have to say, and how it changes as they get older. That's actually what inspired me to expand the tradition to on a larger scale during our annual family Thanksgiving gathering. This year I am setting up a "Give Thanks" jar on the table and asking that everyone write on a piece of paper the things they are thankful for and place it inside. As an added incentive for those that might be a little hesitant to write out their list I have little treat bags with goodies inside for after they are done. Then after we enjoy our meal as a family I am going to read them allowed for everyone to hear. I thought it would be a nice tradition to start, and a nice addition for a page in my family scrapbook.

And who better to celebrate Thanksgiving with other than the original creators of Thanksgiving themselves (okay so maybe not the original)....the Peanuts gang! There aren't too many Thanksgiving cartoons out there and I have to say I'm quite okay with that because this one is my favorite. And I am sure you can agree they make pretty awesome table decor.

Thanksgiving decor and more from Oriental Trading:
Celebrate the Thanksgiving holiday with festive party supplies and Thanksgiving! Find a variety of decorating themes, including fall, pumpkin and turkey. Get the kids a great holiday activity with a variety of easy-to-assemble Thanksgiving crafts. Create party treat bags with fall-themed treats, kids' stationery and novelty Thanksgiving toys. Choose candy treats for your guests or Thanksgiving mints for the dinner table. Enjoy your family get-together by creating a photo booth complete with stick props, fall accessories and Thanksgiving costumes for the kids! From Thanksgiving home decor to crafts for kids, find plenty of fun ideas at everyday low prices.

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Disclosure: This is a sponsored post on behalf of the above mentioned brand. I received product(s) in exchange for my honest and unbiased thoughts. All thoughts and opinions stated are my own and are in no way influenced by my partnership with mentioned brands.

Happy Fall Y'all!

One of my favorite parts of fall has to be the colors. I love when the leaves on the trees start to turn from their brightly colored greens to even more beautiful yellows, oranges, and reds. Living in the country you really get the opportunity to appreciate the physical changes in nature as they happen. Not just as they change colors on the trees, but as the leaves fall off the trees too of course! Either way I am very thankful for the blessing of a large window to look out every day and see these changes take place. Of course after all the leaves have changed and fallen off the trees it's not quite as beautiful outdoors. And that's why I enjoy decorating inside my house for fall too. Then I can appreciate those fall colors even longer.

My daughter and I recently took on the task of doing some at home fall decor DIY projects. One of them was making a new centerpiece for our bookshelf in the living room and I have to say I am quite impressed with how well it all came together. We painted three ceramic pumpkins and a wooden tray and then added some fall colored leaves for an extra splash of color. It looks really nice sitting on the bookshelf and gives the room a nice fall feel. Plus I had the added bonus of some mother-daughter bonding time which was pretty great in my book.

Another project we did was a DIY fall wreath. I was a little nervous on this one because it actually required me to think outside of the box when it came to decorating it. But once again I have to say I am impressed with myself because as you can see it turned out quite nice. I've included some steps/tips below in case you'd like to give this project a try!

1. I used a metal wreath frame which helped me quite a bit to get started.
2. I cut a circle from cardboard and then did some cuts a few inches in all the way around it (making it look like a sunshine) then weaved it onto the wreath frame giving me a flat surface to glue my paper cone onto.
3. I used scrapbook paper cut into four 6 x 6 pieces for the colorful cones.
4. On the ends of the solid colored papers I used some fall embellishments for variety.
5. In the center I layered some fall leaves and finished it off with a large button in the middle.

Really it ended up being a pretty easy project once I got started. The hardest part was laying it all out to decide what papers and decor I wanted to use on it.

So there you have it now I'm ready indoors and outdoors to welcome my guests with a Happy Fall Y'all! (PS: I didn't really paint that on my pumpkins it's just added text to my photo.)

You can find supplies for both of these projects right on the Oriental Trading website under Fall.

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Disclosure: This is a sponsored post on behalf of the above mentioned brand. I received product(s) in exchange for my honest and unbiased thoughts. All thoughts and opinions stated are my own and are in no way influenced by my partnership with mentioned brands.

Halloween Treats Buffet Style

When it comes to the holidays like Halloween right now I tend to do a little extra. My son is 17 so he's already outgrown dressing up for Halloween, and with my daughter being in middle school now I'm sure it won't be much longer until she's outgrown it too. So for these last few remaining years I'm going to enjoy it while she still wants to dress up and do fun things with her friends. Because after that I'll be waiting until I have grand-kids to be able to have as much fun. Living in the country we really don't get a ton of trick-or-treaters so I usually have to go to a friends house if I want to pass out candy. Or like we are doing this year let my daughter have some friends over for a mini-Halloween party. We thought it would be a good way for her to get to know some of her new middle school friends, and of course it allows me to do that "little extra" for Halloween. We are having some of the kids come over one afternoon after school for a few hours to play some Halloween themed games, and of course pick out some fun treats to take home with them.

To make things a little different I decided it would be fun to do a Halloween buffet. It seems like now days there are so many restrictions on what kids can and can't have so I thought this would be a great way to offer them the choice of what they want for their treats. Plus it was a lot of fun for me to get it all together and ready for them to dig in!

For my Halloween treats buffet I used a fun Halloween themed table runner, orange candy buckets, stress eyeballs, mini stress putty, Halloween themed pretzels, and an assortment of candy. It was super easy to do through ordering off the Oriental Trading website under Halloween Decor and Halloween Headquarters. I love being able to shop for everything in one place. It saves a ton of time and I don't even have to leave my house. Plus it's always fun seeing my daughter's reaction when the big ole box arrives and she gets to see what all I ordered.

Now to wait a few more weeks until it's closer to Halloween for our little Halloween Gathering. In the meantime here's to hoping I can keep it all hidden good enough to for the supplies to last until then!

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Disclosure: This is a sponsored post on behalf of the above mentioned brand. I received monetary compensation or product(s) in exchange for my honest and unbiased thoughts. All thoughts and opinions stated are my own and are in no way influenced by my partnership with mentioned brands.

Whose Got the Best Candy?

Every year at Halloween I always here the kids discussing which house they are going to first and whose got the best candy. Silly me I always thought to a kid any candy was the "best" candy. But boy was I wrong. After following my daughter and one of her friends around a neighborhood last year for Halloween I learned a thing or two. There are houses that give out small amounts of candy like a single piece of bubble gum, and there are other houses that give out bigger treats like a handful of all sorts of candy. Heck we even went to one house that had treats for us adults. I was quite impressed at this point and began to understand the strategic planning that went into their evening. It also gave me a little more insight into how I should plan my Halloween candy shopping for this year. I decided that I was going to not only do my usual name brand candies like M&M's but also do some of the smaller candies so I could give kids a handful of treats. You know be one of those "Best Candy" houses. And I even picked up some fun Pumpkin shaped tins filled with mints for the adults that actually come up to the door with the kids. I'm all about being the fun place to come for Halloween. It's always neat seeing the kids in their costumes and hearing how excited they are when you give them some treats.

You can find these sweet treats and lots of others in the Halloween section of the Oriental Trading website.

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Disclosure: This is a sponsored post on behalf of the above mentioned brand. I received product(s) in exchange for my honest and unbiased thoughts. All thoughts and opinions stated are my own and are in no way influenced by my partnership with mentioned brands.

Ready..Set..Glow!

I don't know why, but when I think about Halloween besides thinking of all the tasty treats it makes me think about things that glow in the dark. Maybe it's because there are so many kiddos out on the sidewalks in the dark and as parents we want to make sure people see our kids. Or maybe because glow-in-the-dark things are also a fun thing to give in place of sugary sweets. I know kids love all the candy that they get when they are out trick-or-treating, but I also know they love getting fun things like glow-in-the-dark slime and glow-in-the-dark necklaces. I know this because as soon as mine arrived my daughter was already begging me to let her have a necklace and pink slime. She said it was so she could "test it" for me. You know put it under the light and then run off to her bedroom and shut the door to see it glow. Of course I really knew what that meant, that after the so called testing I would never see them again. I guess it was a good thing I got a good sized package of each from Oriental Trading's Halloween shop.

I tried to take my own photos of the necklaces and slime glowing but as you know if you take a photo in the dark your camera instinctively wants to use the flash to make it light. And when I turned off the flash and tried it all you could see was faint little spots of color. So instead I've included the photos from the Oriental Trading website so you can see exactly how they look in the dark. :-) 

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Disclosure: This is a sponsored post on behalf of the above mentioned brand. I received product(s) in exchange for my honest and unbiased thoughts. All thoughts and opinions stated are my own and are in no way influenced by my partnership with mentioned brands.

Stocking Stuffers and crafts galore!

One thing I love about Christmas is filling the kids stockings. It's always fun to fill them with an assortment of candies and fun things then watch to see how excited they get. Every year I try to do something a little different from the previous year and I try to do some sort of theme. This year I decided that everything was going to be Christmas themed. So I picked out some fun Christmas candies and stocking stuffers that were red, green, and white. 

Another thing I get excited about doing is making up goodie bags for my daughter's class at school. I love it when she comes home all excited because her friends liked what was in them. This year I decided to include the history of the candy cane in their bags. They had been talking about different traditions in class so I thought this would be a great way for them to take home what they've been learning about.

While the kids are on break from school we always like to do DIY crafts together. It's always fun because we get out all sorts of crafting supplies and see what fun things we can come up with. This year I wanted to do something special so we are going to make snow globes and decorate snowflakes. Then we will give them as gifts at our New Years party. The kids love making things they can give to others and make them smile. And me? Well I just love spending quality time with my kids so it's a win-win for us all!

Do you have any great ideas or traditions you'd like to share? Please feel free to leave them for me in the comments below.

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Disclosure: I received compensation in the form of product in exchange for my honest and unbiased thoughts. All thoughts and opinions stated are my own and are in no way influenced by my partnership with mentioned brands.

Art class isn't just for school, it's for home too!

One of my daughter's favorite classes at school has always been art. She likes it because she can be more creative in her work unlike other classes where she has to follow more specific instructions. Sometimes though she comes home telling me it's not as fun as it used to be because they have to do more detailed projects now, and everyone is doing the same thing. So as a way to help combat that and keep her from falling away from being creative in something she likes I've started having "art class" at home for her. I have a bunch of various crafting supplies from Oriental Trading so I figured what better way to use them. We've been making things that she can show her creativity and incorporate in her daily life at school so she can still share them with her friends.

First we started off simple and made Name Slap Bracelets. We decided to use some Rainbow Mini Duck Tape® for color (you can also use markers) and a Sharpie® Metallic Marker to write her name. It actually looks really cool with the metallic silver on top of the rainbow background.

Then we decided to make something she could use in class. I'd seen lots of photos of pencil toppers online and thought that might be fun. My daughter of course had to instill her creativity on this one and instead of a simple face she came up with her own creation. I asked her what animal it was and she said it was a feather breathing friendly ghost for Halloween. I silently giggled and told her it was really cute. She then explained to me that instead of scaring people by saying boo, it tickles them with feathers. So much creativity that kid has!

Supplies I used: 
Slap Bracelets
Rainbow Mini Duck Tape®
Sharpie® Metallic Fine Point Permanent Markers

Bulk Feather Assortment
Pom-Poms
Bright Rainbow Craft Buttons
Surebonder® All-Temp Full-Size Glue Sticks

Another evening we sat down and made DIY journal books and decorated them as well as some little canvas pouches. My daughter said I needed a pouch to keep my change in when we go to garage sales in the summer so I made myself a fun pouch. It was really a lot of fun doing crafts with her and she liked that I had something to keep and use myself too instead of everything being made for her to use. I figured why not if it's something I will use so I made myself a journal book too. You know us "super moms" have to write things down occasionally too!

Supplies I used: 
Journals Craft Kit
Canvas Pouches
Fabric Markers
Glitter Paint Pens

In the end we both ended up with some fun stuff that we crafted together and we both had a good time. It was a nice bonding time for us and my daughter got to express her artistic creativity.

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Disclosure: I received compensation in the form of product in exchange for my honest and unbiased thoughts. All thoughts and opinions stated are my own and are in no way influenced by my partnership with mentioned brands.

Spring showers = crafting fun indoors!

I don't know about where you live, but it seems like this spring has already been filled with way too many rainy days. We finally got past the cold days that seemed to just drag on and now we're filled with dreary rainy days. And in my house that means kids that aren't happy because they can't get outside and play. But that's okay because this mom has already started using her crafting skills to keep them entertained. (Okay so maybe some of my skills aren't really mine, they are actually from Pinterest.) But hey, if it keeps them entertained then I'm happy. With a little help from Pinterest and some supplies from Oriental Trading crafting can help pass the time on any day rain or shine.

One of the crafts we recently did was make Homemade Glitter Slime. This is one of those that I borrowed from Pinterest. If you've ever searched there are tons of different variations to the slime/putty recipe out there. We've actually done quite a few different ones, and even purchased a kit that came with several different recipes in it too. You can check out my crafts Pinterest board for lots of recipe ideas if you want to try some yourself.

Supplies I used from Oriental Trading:
Short Jars
Jeweltone Premium Glitter Glue Set

Another craft we've done, that yes I actually came up with was making homemade water globes. I use plastic jars and fill them with water, colored water beads (I let these soak overnight first), and sparkly jewels. If these are going to be played with I actually use a colored glue stick to seal the lids on. It ensures that the lids won't get unscrewed on accident and they spill everywhere. Plus it gives the outside of the jar a little added color too. We've actually done these a few different times now using different things inside to make them themed and even given them as gifts to my daughter's friends. It's amazing how much the kids like playing with these just watching the stuff inside swirl around when they turn them upside down.

Supplies I used from Oriental Trading:
Short Jars
Water Beads
Shiny Flower Jewels
Jewel Assortment
Surebonder® Colorful Mini Glue Sticks

And finally another of my own crafting ideas, and personal favorite (because it's edible of course) is candy flowers. You can create all sorts of different pictures using candy. I don't know about you, but we always seem to have an over abundance of candy laying around after every holiday. What a great way to use it up! And these make great gifts too. My daughter made a bunch of the candy flowers using a bag of spring mix candy and gave them to her teachers at school for teacher appreciation week. She wrote thank you on them with a marker and signed her name at the bottom. Something quick and simple, and everyone that got one loved it. I mean who wouldn't enjoy getting a homemade gift that's covered in candy!

Supplies I used from Oriental Trading:
Lime Green Candy-Filled Straws
Hershey’s® Spring Assortment
Surebonder® Colorful Mini Glue Sticks (to glue down the candy)

Do you have any great crafting ideas you'd like to share? Please feel free to leave them for me in the comments and links if you have shared them yourself online.

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Finding the perfect Valentine's Gifts for the classroom and beyond

Valentine's Day for parents is a whole different game, at least in my house. The focus shifted off my husband and I and onto the kids and their classroom exchanges. But in my opinion it's not just all about classroom exchanges either. Besides your child's teacher there are other staff members that definitely deserve some extra "love" for all they do. So with a little help from Oriental Trading my daughter and I decided to put together some simple, yet super fun Valentine's Day gift boxes.

Here's what we used:
• Valentine Treat Boxes (to hold all of the goodies of course) I also added some tissue paper in the bottom since we weren't packing them full to the top and I didn't want the contents to be all beat up during delivery.

• Valentine Pen on A Rope and a Smile Face Heart-Shaped Stress Ball, you never know if the recipient can't have sweets so it's always best to also throw in a few fun items. Plus what staff member couldn't relieve a little stress in their day right?

• They also all had some of each kind of candy: Chocolate Conversation Hearts, Hershey's® Kisses®, Red Foil-Wrapped Hard Candy and Red Striped Hard Candy Balls.

• I then finished it off with some Red Mesh Tube Ribbon to give it a little added flair.

Really quite simple, yet it looks like we really put a lot of thought and heart into it (pun intended).

And of course we still do the classroom exchange thing too. My daughter's in 4th grade so it's still all the hype with the kids. Plus she's in after school activities so she wants to pass out Valentines there too. Which of course means we need more than one bag of cards/candy. The nice thing about shopping online is there's not quite as many to choose from as there is in store so I can have my daughter quickly pick between a few options. Plus we can shop by how many are in a bag quickly and easily too. With these kits she can still fill out the To/From Valentines cards and give each of her friends a little treat too.

Here's the ones we picked for her classroom and friends:
• Valentine Owl Skittles® Valentine Card Kit - Super cute cards that hold little bags of Skittles.

• AirHeads® Valentine Bites - Little bags of bites with a place on the bag for names.

• Reese’s® Peanut Butter Conversation Cups - Individually wrapped peanut butter cups, these are great for exchanges or just for fun.

With the convenience of online shopping I love that I can skip the checkout lines in stores and get everything it all in one convenient place. No large crowds to deal with or having to tell my kids no to every other Valentine's Day gift or trinket they pick up either. So a big THANK YOU to online stores like Oriental Trading for making this mom's life easier!

DIY Animal Christmas Ornaments with a little help from Oriental Trading

My daughter loves to do crafts so we often work together to come up with ideas of crafts for her Girl Scout troop. With Christmas approaching we decided it would be fun to do some DIY Christmas ornaments with the girls. It seems like everyone already does the applesauce ornaments and the ones with their photo inside so we wanted to do something a little different. After a little browsing around different places for ideas we settled on making animal ornaments. We tested out our project idea at home before taking it to the meeting and it worked great! We did find out however that only the smaller poms fit inside the ornaments so we decided to do them as well as feathers so the girls could choose which they wanted.

The girls all had a great time stuffing their ornaments and adding on the details for the animals faces (or wings). I had gotten ceramic markers from Oriental Trading to write on the glass ornaments and they worked perfectly. The ink dried almost instantly so it didn't rub off on their hands which was an added bonus. Each of the girls made an ornament using their own creativity and I have to say I was quite impressed with some of them. Some of the animals they made were a bird, cat, bunny, lion, frog, flaming, and peacock. They really are a creative bunch. And I'm happy to report that with a group of 11 girls goofing around while they were being creative not a single glass ornament got broken! That's more than I can say for the wiggly eyes that were found pretty much everywhere. But hey, that's what fun and creativity are all about.

Products used to decorate the ornaments:
Glitter Poms, Tiny Poms & Feathers to fill them.
Christmas Ribbon to tie at the top.
Wiggly Eyes for the animals to see.
Ceramic Markers to draw the animals faces (or wings).

Having a Birthday Party with a little help from Oriental Trading!

As some of you may know both my son and daughter had their birthdays earlier this month. Their birthdays are exactly a week apart so we usually have a combined party with our relatives to make it easier on everyone. This year they decided they would like to have a hunting themed party since they both enjoy hunting with their dad. I knew right away exactly where I was going to look for party supplies so I pulled up the Oriental Trading website and started looking for hunting themed supplies under their party section. I was actually quite surprised at how many great themed things they had in this category. I could have gotten the entire line of table service products in camouflage even. I chose to only get the dessert plates (shown above) because we were having the party in a restaurant this time and didn't need all the other stuff like cups/napkins etc. I also got a themed tablecloth for the kids present and cake table so it would stand out from the other tables in the room as being for them. It was a super nice plastic tablecloth that I was even able to just wipe off the little bit of icing that got on it and fold it back up to use again later. I've purchased some in the past that were so thin they ripped with just the slightest tug. This one didn't rip at all and was really nice looking with their themed decor. I also picked out a really cute display stand with a deer on top that holds little paper cones. I filled them with brown candies (my idea of deer poo) also from Oriental Trading. The kids all loved them and the adults thought it was a super cute idea.

Another great item I found was a package of Magic Color Scratch Paper Activity Sheets. If you're not familiar with those they are what looks like black sheets of paper that actually are full color underneath. They remind me of a scratch off ticket. They come with little sticks making it easy to draw and create lots of great pictures. The kids (and adults) loved these and kept busy through out the party drawing away. These are great to just have on hand for fun too.

And finally I got a few decor items.  I hung the Hunting Hanging Swirls above all the tables where we were eating and where the presents were at. I hung the Big Buck Cutout on a flat wall and we used it to play pin the bulls-eye on the buck. My SIM card in my camera got messed up and I lost about half my party photos and unfortunately I lost the ones of the kids playing the game. But you can see what it looks like in the above photo. I made little bulls-eyes and put glue dots on the back then blindfolded the kids for a little fun game.

All in all we had a wonderful time at the party and everyone was super excited about my decor. I have to thank Oriental Trading for the awesome party supplies because they helped make my kids birthday party a big hit!

Products featured at the birthday party from Oriental Trading:
• The Hunt Is On Treat Stand with Cones
• Brown Chocolate Candies
• The Hunt Is On Tablecloth
• Camouflage Dessert Plates
• Big Buck Jointed Cutout
• Hunting Hanging Swirls
• Magic Color Scratch Paper Activity Sheets