This past weekend we had the honor of being a part of this beautiful First Communion celebration in Vaughan, Ontario.

The mom organized such a beautiful event.  The main colours were blush, pink and gold.  From the cotton candy booth, to the stunning unicorn themed cakepops, cake and party decor, to the activities for the children, every last detail was thought of.  The guest of honor loves to craft, and so the mom incorporated our First Communion Rosary Bracelet Package into the event.  We were so happy when she wanted to put on her bracelet right away and was proudly showing all the other guests.  The children each made a rosary bracelet which then became their party favour.  We also brought a special cross colouring page which the children absolutely loved.

We truly enjoyed every moment of this incredible event, and the mother was such a pleasure to deal with, her organization, attention to detail and kindness made this an event we will never forget.

This post we are highlighting a Sophia the First 6 year old birthday tea party in Toronto, Ontario.  This party took place at the King Edward Hotel downtown Toronto and was such an incredible event.  The King Edward Hotel has always been one of our favourite places in Toronto, and it had the perfect ambiance for a Royal Tea Party.   The birthday's girl's mom was one of the sweetest and organized  moms we have ever worked with and were were so impressed at the event that she planned.

The party guests made our fancy bracelet package with unicorn charms, we used purple beads to match the party theme.  After the beading was completed, the mom invited princesses and other entertainment for the guests.  The girls then had high tea at the stunning Toronto King Edward Hotel.

The mom decorated the event in purple and pink balloons, and decorated the tables with pink hats, purple flower petals and Sophia themed decor.

This was such an amazing party and we felt so lucky to be a part of it.  A big thank you to the amazing birthday girl's mom for sending us her beautiful photos and for inviting us to be part of such a special celebration.

We do so many amazing birthday parties such as a American Girl birthday tea party that we recently did in Oakville, Ontario.  This mom had so many easy and craft DIY ideas that we just had to pass on.

The mom invited all the guests to bring their favourite doll.  The entire party was planned with fun activities incorporating the dolls.   The girls made friendship bracelets with matching necklaces for their dolls which became the party loot bag. 

Then the mom set up the cutest tea party, with seating for all the girls and their dolls.  She made heart shaped sandwiches inspired by this blog post.  The mom also made a cake with the AG star on it and then added a tiara, such a simple idea but with so much impact.  The mom made star sugar cookies ahead of time using this recipe and then the girls decorated them and took them home as a loot bag.

It was one of the cutest parties and the girls all had such a great time!  For more American Girl party ideas check out our American Girl blog post.

Fruit kabobs are perfect for a jewelry making birthday party because they suit the theme of beading and they are also a yummy and healthy snack that is fun to eat.

Ingredients

•  strawberries
•  cantaloupe
• pineapple
• honeydew melon
• watermelon
• bamboo skewers

Directions

• If using wooden or bamboo skewers, make sure all the splinters are off of them by rolling two together in your hands, or rub them over each other, as if you are sharpening a knife.
• Cut the fruit that is not already small into 1-inch, or bite-size, chunks.  Another fun idea is to cut out fruit using cookie cutters to make hearts, butterflies or flowers.
• Skewer the fruit.  Finish the skewer with 2 blueberries on the pointed end to hold the fruit in place. 

One of our favourite party themes ever is a unicorn party theme.  We adore all the beautiful magical colours and how much fun you can have with this magical theme.

A mom booking a beading party was doing a unicorn theme and asked us if we could design a custom beading project for her party, of course we said yes, and we were thrilled with how it turned out and wanted to share this awesome party theme with you!

Party Invitations:
This is such an easy theme to choose invites for because there are so many beautiful unicorn invitations to choose from.  You can also download a printable invitation online such as this one.
 

Party Decor:
We adore the colour scheme that you would use for this party.  All pastel colours, such as pastel blue, pastel pink, pastel purple, pastel pink, pastel green and pastel yellow.  You would also use gold and gold glitter.

Blow up balloons in pastal colours and blow up clear balloons and fill them with glitter see here for instructions. 

Hang up dreamcatchers in pastel colours, you can make these yourself, like this beautiful one from Kara's party ideas. 

You can also make your own garland like this one in pastel colours to match your theme.

Party Food:
For a unicorn party you want the food to look as beautiful as possible and in pastel colours, such as marshmallows, chocolate covered pretzels, and unicorn bark (click here for recipe).  

When making your cake or cupcake, make the inside of the cake rainbow, this is such a fun surprise for the guests.  When making the cake or cupcakes, use pastel colours and lots of gold glitter.

Party Activities:
This party is all about magical fun.  Hand out unicorn horns to all of the guests to wear during the party.  Have them decorate ice cream cones with icing and sprinkles to make their own unicorn themed treat.  You can also play pin the horn on the unicorn and have a unicorn pinata.  Another fun idea is to have the girls make jewelry with a unicorn charm.  For more information about our fancy bracelet birthday party packages.

We hope that you have as much fun planning your unicorn themed birthday party as we had doing this post. 

Last spring, after receiving so many requests for sparkly beads, we decided to create our sparkliest package yet and we are so excited to announce that this package, our fancy bracelet package, is a huge hit!  We are very proud to say that our little beaders are loving it and it has become our most requested package.

One of our favourite parts of doing what we do is seeing the expressions of absolute delight when the guests at our parties see what they are making, and see all the beads and charms that they get to work with. 

Our little beaders (and their moms!) love the wide selection of charms, such as unicorn, fairy, ballet, hearts, snowflakes and even sport themed charms.  We made this package with a girl's hockey theme and they were so excited to have beautiful sparkly bracelet with a cool hockey charm.

Our biggest reward is seeing the joy that our service brings.  If you or your little crafter have a party theme in mind, let us know and we can order charms in to match your party theme.

Thank you to all of our wonderful customers for allowing us to keep doing what we do.

When we book our birthday parties, moms often ask us for tips for planning their jewelry making birthday party.  One of our favourite suggestions is for the mom to make a jewelry box birthday cake.  Here is the perfect jewelry box cake recipe.

Ingredients

Lid:

• 8 whole graham crackers (2 squares each)
• 10 oz. white baking chocolate

Jewelry Box Cake:

• 2 box poundcake mix (preferably Betty Crocker)
• 2 can strawberry frosting
• 1 can Vanilla Frosting

Compartments & Drawer:

• 4 whole graham crackers
• 9 creme-filled sugar wafer cookies
• 1 white gumball

Jewelry:

• Assorted edible jewelry such as rings, necklaces, bracelets, and gumballs
• You also need: 1 icing bag with a small star tip and a writing tip

1. Make Lid: On a large foil-lined baking sheet arrange 4 whole graham crackers, flat sides down and long sides touching. Next to them, add 1 more row, narrow ends touching, to make a rectangle about 10 x 8 3⁄4 in. Melt white chocolate as package directs. Evenly spread over crackers to cover. (If some seeps between crackers, that's OK.) Let chocolate dry overnight.
2. Make Jewelry Box Cake: Heat oven to 325ºF. Coat a 13 x 9 x 2-in. baking pan with nonstick spray. Line bottom with wax paper; spray paper. Prepare 1 box cake mix as package directs. Spread batter evenly in prepared pan. Bake 25 minutes, or until a wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool on a wire rack 10 minutes before inverting on rack to cool completely. Repeat with other box of cake mix. Wrap and refrigerate.
3. To assemble: Carefully invert Lid so chocolate is underneath. Spread top with 2⁄3 cup strawberry frosting.
4. Cut a 2-in. strip from one short end of each cake. Cut a 1-in. piece crosswise off 1 strip. Set aside uncut strip and 1-in. piece for drawer (you won't need rest of cut strip).
5. Put 1 cake layer, right side up, on a flat 14 x 12-in. or larger serving surface, leaving at least 2 1⁄2 in. from front edge of serving surface for the drawer. Spread top of cake with 2⁄3 cup strawberry frosting; top with other cake, right side up. Frost top with 2⁄3 cup vanilla frosting.
6. Make Compartments: Using a sawing motion with a serrated knife, carefully cut remaining 4 crackers in half lengthwise. Frost 1 side using 2 Tbsp vanilla frosting. Put frosted sides, facing in, into frosting around top edge of cake. Set wafer cookies, long edge down, into frosting to make compartments.
7. Reserve 1⁄4 cup vanilla frosting. Place remaining vanilla frosting in pastry bag fitted with writing tip. With shorter edge of frosted lid facing you, pipe name and butterflies on top 3⁄4 of lid (when attached to box, bottom of lid won't be seen).
8. Frost sides of cake with 1 1⁄3 cup strawberry frosting. Carefully lift lid and attach to back of cake, gently pressing to adhere to frosting on cake. Stack filled food cans against back of lid to hold it in place until frosting sets.
9. Make Drawer: Press reserved cake strip A (click here for diagram ) and 1-in. piece B onto front of cake. Frost top and sides with reserved 1⁄4 cup vanilla frosting. Place remaining halved crackers, frosted sides in, around drawer. Coat with strawberry frosting. Press gumball knob in center.
10. Pipe butterflies on sides of cake. Change piping tip to star tip. Pipe stars around lid, top of box and drawer. Let set at least 4 to 6 hours. Remove cans.
11. Fill with edible jewelry.
12. To make rings & earrings: Use frosting to glue assorted rock candy or gumballs to gummy or regular Lifesavers candies.

We found the recipe here, for great cake ideas check out http://www.womansday.com.

Lately we have noticed a large trend in Shopkins themed birthday parties, and we think it's such a fun theme and goes perfectly with a beading birthday party.

Here is how to have an amazing Shopkins themed beading birthday party.

First you need some Shopkins themed party invitations.  A great way to make invitations is to use a free online printable or template to create a custom Shopkins birthday party invite.  Here is a sample of a fun and easy template.

Once the invites are sent out it is time to start planning your party decor.  Use lots of bright colours.  Use online printables to print out large Shopkins characters or banners with Shopkins characters on them.  Using marker, add faces to popcorn cups to make your own Poppy Corn.

A fun idea of what to do at your party is to make Shopkins themed bff necklaces.  Here is a link showing you how to make these necklaces.  You can add this charm to any of our amazing birthday party packages.

Another fun game is to play Shopkins trivia or provide Shopkins colour pages.  Visit shopkinsworld.com for great printables.

Make your own Shopkins themed pinata and fill it with candy and Shopkins. 

When choosing your cake, be sure to include Shopkins in the theme, the guests will be thrilled to receive their own Shopkins.  An easy and fun idea is to frost cupcakes in your favourite bright colours and then place a Shopkin on top of each cupcake.

We hope you find our Shopkins birthday party tips helpful! 

We are often invited to attend at residences for seniors in the Toronto area to help them make beautiful jewelry. We love these workshops and always leave with a smile on our face knowing that we have brightened somebody's day, made new friends and the residents are so proud of their creations!

Jewelry making is an amazing tool to help with fine motor skills for seniors, but many seniors do have limitations and so we have come up with a few tips to make beading easier and more fun. More information on developmental benefits of beading with seniors.

Tips for beading with seniors:

1)  Bring a sample of what they are making.  Seniors are very visual, and it is easier for them to pick their colours and style of beads once they see a completed version of what they will be creating.

2.  Use beads with large holes.  Some seniors may struggle with their eye sight and eye and hand coordination and beads with large holes make things easier.

3.  Use brightly coloured beads.  Seniors love beads with bold and bright colours, they are also easier for them to see, so therefore easier for them to pattern and design with.

4.  Use a string that is easy for them to use.  Our favourite string is tiger tail, because it is stiff, it is easy for them to string beads onto.

5.  Use a clasp on their project that they can open and close themselves.  The first time we ever did a workshop with seniors we used lobster clasps.  At our next session the seniors told us they were not able to wear what they made because they could not put it on, of course we switched all the clasps to toggle claps and to this day, that is the only clasp that we use with seniors.

Click here for more information on our workshops with seniors.

We have noticed that many moms booking Beading Buds jewellery making birthday parties often go with a tea party theme.  One of our favourite tea party themes is a Fancy Nancy tea party, because you can go so over the top with this theme.

Invite
Make the invite as fancy as possible using stickers, sticker gems, ribbons and glitter.  There are many websites with Fancy Nancy printables.  The official Fancy Nancy website also has lots of printables for you to use at the party as part of the party entertainment.

Party Decor
Fancy Nancy is all about being fabulous!  So this is your chance for a super girly and fancy party.  Decorate the chairs and tables with pink feather boas, tiaras, big floppy hats, fancy sunglasses and pearl necklaces (this can also double as a party loot bag). 

Hang up big bunches of gold, silver, black and pink balloons and streamers.

Cake
Do a pink cake or cupcake and decorate with pink feather boas, tiaras, big floppy hats, fancy sunglasses and pearl necklaces or any combination of these items.

Party Activities
Go to the Fancy Nancy website to get lots of great printables for the guests to use.  You can provide a box of dressup clothes and have the girls do a fashion show.  This is a great chance for you to get some great photos of the girls.  A Beading Buds jewelry making kit is also a great option, the girls can make beautiful fancy jewelry.

There are so many other great ideas for a Fancy Nancy Party.  Check out our Fancy Nancy pinterest page for more party inspiration.