Thanks to Brother for sponsoring this post and providing crafters with a cool tool for our trade! 

I grew up with a mom that really knew how to do birthday parties. She could carry a theme from the invite (back when we sent paper invitations), to the activity, to the cake, to the favor. And this was well before Martha Stewart and Pinterest came along.

So regardless of my crafty career, there is no doubt that my kids’ parties would always be cohesive since that is what I knew to be normal. When I asked my almost six-year-old daughter, Sommer, what she wanted to do for her birthday, she said she wanted an animal party. But not one single animal…she didn’t want to hurt any species’ feelings by being left out. (Can you even stand it?)

When my friends at Brother asked me to design a party using their P-touch Embellish Ribbon & Tape Printer, I was giddy with the endless possibilities. I laid all of my ribbons and tapes in front of me and realized that I literally had the entire rainbow at my fingertips, so I dove in and used the full spectrum, creating an animal party full of whimsy and joy with animal faces that all kids will fall in love with!

Here’s how we celebrated and what we made…

PAPER PAW-TY HATS

To carry the animal theme, we used the adorable paw print symbol to make ribbon tassels for the tops of basic party hats. Here is a free printable that you can use to print out these cute, animal hat medallions.

ANIMAL TRIVIA GAME

This is the third time I’ve made a punch game for my kids’ birthday parties. They love the action of punching and the surprise of what’s inside!

What you’ll need:

• Clear cups
• Tissue paper
• Hot glue gun
• Craft glue
• Pencil
• Sponge brush
• Small toys
• Foam core
• P-touch Embellish Ribbon & Tape Printer
• P-touch TZe ribbons and patterned tapes
• Craft sticks (we used the big wavy type!)

Make it:

1. Count out the number of cups you need and arrange them on your board in an interesting shape.
2. Wrap small toys in colored tissue and put them in the cups.
3. Trace cup onto the tissue paper and cut out as many circles (just outside of your pencil line) as you have cups, matching the color of the circles to the paper inside.
4. Print the answers to your trivia questions on TZe tape and adhere one to each circle.
5. Use the sponge brush to apply a thin layer of glue on the edge of the cup and gently pat the tissue circle on the edges.
6. Hot glue the bottoms of the cup to the board.
7. Print the trivia questions on TZe tape and adhere them to wooden craft sticks.
8. To play, each guest picks a stick, reads the questions, and has to find the answer. They use the stick to punch through the tissue paper to get their prize!

ANIMAL CUPCAKE TOPPERS

What you’ll need:

• Colored lollipop sticks
• Free animal printable (this is the same as the hat printable above) 
• P-touch Embellish Ribbon & Tape Printer and TZe tapes
• Hot glue gun
• Scissors

1. Print out the animal cupcake toppers and cut them out.
2. Print message on different tapes, making sure to feed enough extra so that the back is covered.
3. Hot glue animal face to the top of the stick.
4. Peel P-touch Embellish tape and wrap them around the stick, just below the animal. Trim the ends into a flag shape.

ANIMAL FAVOR BAGS

What you’ll need:

• 5-by-7-inch muslin favor bags
• P-touch Embellish Ribbon & Tape Printer and P-touch Embellish Ribbons
• Transfer iron-on paper
• Printable animals faces
• Scissors
• Iron
• Hot-glue gun

1. Print out a message on each bag. We customized ours for each guest. They read “Thanks for coming to my party, Evie! Love, Sommer” (That extra special touch is what makes this tool so unique!)
2. Hot-glue the ends of the ribbon to either side of the opening of the bag.
3. Cut out the iron-on animal heads and iron to the bags, according to the product’s package instructions.
4. Stuff with small toys and treats. (We even labeled pencils with the P-touch TZe tape with goofy messages like “Write on, Oliver!”)

If you want to decorate with the adorable animal-face garland that we made, you can print out these, cut out the circles, and string them onto a thin string. Just punch two holes at the top of each circle to thread the string through.

Thanks to Brother for sponsoring this post and providing crafters with a new tool for our trade! 

Illustrations and animal paintings by Clare Yaghjian

Photography by Michael Cohen

Video by Lucy Schaeffer

Editing by Annie Bernstein

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July 19, 2018| ad, Animals, Birthdays, Decor, Early Elementary, Favors, Food, Games & Activities, Older Elementary, Parties, Preschool, Printables, Toddler