a Bug Theme Birthday!

BUGS! BUGS! BUGS!

Creepy Crawlies of all sizes are so much fun for a little boy.  For my little Bug's 2nd Birthday, a BUG theme was a must.

Many ideas came from Pinterest:  http://pinterest.com/sschaedel/bugs-birthday-theme/.  What an amazing resource to have, LOVE IT!

Colour Scheme:  Greens mainly but some blue and yellow also

INVITES:

This was the first invitation I did.  It's scrapbooked with the intention of getting photograph copies made but didnt end up having time to get out of town to have thatdone.  So my second invite I made (and forgot to take a picture I suppose) was a green leaf cut from construction paper.  I added some bug stickers and wrote the same as this.  

"This little BUG is turning 2!  Creep, Crawl, or Fly on over to celebrate Alex's Birthday!"

CAKE:

The CAKE!  In a clean new pail, I assembled a chocolate trifle -- so easy!  Layers of chocolate cake, and a mixture of cool whip & chocolate pudding.  Then a layer of oreo cookie crumbs on top for dirt.  Served with a shovel and a gummy worm for each serving.  It was a hit!

DECORATIONS:

From the ceiling I hung a cluster of green, blue, and yellow balloons. 

In the spot where he would be opening presents (as shown in pic) I hung a sign I made from bristol board and a grassy green rug I purchased from Walmart awhile ago. 

Another decoration I did was to hang bugs cut from craft foam from the lights over our island.  They wiggled & dangled in the air adding a fun buggy atmosphere.

A yard of fabric with bugs was used as a table cloth. 

ACTIVITIES:

Digging For Bugs was a huge attraction for the kids.  I filled a green snow sled (could also use a shallow rubbermail bin) with sand and LOTS of rubber bugs bought from Halloween clearance and the Dollar Store.  Kids used rakes and filled up jars.  The jars were left from Epicure spices with their lids all spray painted black (baby food jars another option!)  I attached a sticky label saying "Bug Jar".  The kids also put in a small green construction paper leaf to feed their bugs.  Their was also colouring pages for the kids.  Due to the age of the kids, I mainly just had free play going on.

 FOOD:

Everything needed cute little labels to appreciate the cute bugginess.
Crunchy Crickets: ..... Popcorn Twists
Wiggly Worms: ... hotdogs (each dog sliced lengthwise to create four strips before boiled.  They curl when cooked!)
Pickled Caterpillars: ..... Pickle spears
Beetle Bites:..... Cheese chunks
Fish Flies:   .... goldfish crackers
Worm Juice: ....Juice with wormy ice cubes.  {put a worm in each part of ice cube tray.  fill with juice or water.  freeze.  add to juice at party}

LOOTBAGS:
(sadly no picture!)
a ziploc baggie with their jar of bugs, bug stickers, a small ziploc of gummy worms, and a rubber ball with a bug inside it.  Plus a thank you card as well.


Enjoy your bug theme, there are so many options and variations you can do!

Easy Spider Web Craft

This craft is done with two paper plates (for sturdiness), black paint, white yarn, black pipe cleaners, black paper, glue, and googly eyes.

Spider: Cut two black circles from black paper. Put a huge glob of glue on one circle and lay your pipecleaner legs in the glue. Add a little more glue and then put your other black circle on top. Glue on eyes. This will seem like its not working but just leave it to dry and it will be fine - trust me!

Web: Paint paper plate black. Let dry. Make small cuts around the edge of plate. Wrap your yarn around and around the plate to resemble a web. Tie a hanging loop and then tie your spider (hole punch a hole in the spider to tie yarn on through) dangling from your web.

The Very Busy Spider Craft Activities

Next week we are reading "The Very Busy Spider" by Eric Carle at Toy Library as it is my daughters turn to bring in a favourite book. One of his many fabulous books. We will be doing a craft afterwards and here are some of the fabulous ideas I have found or thought of.


SPIDERS:

Egg Carton Spider: a cube cut from a cardboard egg carton. Painted black or coloured with markers or covered in tissue paper that is glued on. Poke in pipe cleaners for legs and glue on googly eyes. Easy peasy!

Bottle Cap or Lid Spider: Using a jar lid or bottle cap, glue on legs & googly eyes. Can't get much simpler!

Styrafoam Ball Spider: Styrafoam balls painted black. Pipe cleaners poked in for legs and googly eyes glued on.

Handprint Spider: Have child dip hand in black paint. Place on paper to make two handprints together so they meet at the wrist. Put on eyes.

Thumbprint Spiders: Place child's thumb in ink and press onto paper in several spots. Let child draw legs & eyes on spider. Could also do this onto a web.

PomPom Spider: Two different sized pom poms glued together with pipecleaner legs & eyes.

Sure couldnt live without those googly eyes! they are a staple in our craft supplies and get reused when a craft gets tossed.


WEBS:

Glittery Web: Draw a web on a piece of paper. Let child trace with glue. Sprinkle with glitter and shake off excess. Glue on a spider - either made by child or cut out by adult for them to glue on.

Laced Web: Styrafoam plate with holes punched along edge. Let child "sew" the web by placing yarn through one hole and then pulling through a hole on opposite side of plate and then back to the other side etc. Or they can put through random holes for an abstract web.

Marble Web: Place black or dark paper in bottom of cardboard box. Place a few small dobs of white glue sporadically on paper. Place a marble on the paper and gently roll to create a beautiful white web.

Painted Web (with string): Put a long length of string into a puddle of paint. Coat string thoroughly. Pull string out and lay in random pattern on paper. Move string to create the web look you want. Remove string. Your fabulous web now needs some spiders - thumbprint spiders look great!

this pic done with the string painting & thumbprint spiders

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One of the above spider crafts would look great on these webs!

The Very Hungry Caterpillar Birthday Party

For my daughter's 3rd Birthday, we are using the theme from the book "THE VERY HUNGRY CATERPILLAR"

These are some of the ideas I have found and will pick and choose from them for what will work for me. Once we have the party, I will post pics too!


INVITATIONS:

* Green Construction Paper folded into card shape and then cut into shape of leaf. Perhaps a "Bite" cut from it. Details inside.

* Using daughter's thumbprints and red & green ink, create caterpillar on front of card.


FOOD:

*Fruit skewers of 4 green grapes and 1 red strawberry (resembles caterpillar)

*Foods from the book and a hole in each (strawberries, cheese, salami, etc.)

* Red Juice with green ice cubes

* Pasta Salad or Mac n' Chz made with the twirly noodles that look like worms.


CRAFT:

* Pompoms & Googly eyes glued onto green construction paper leaf to resemble caterpillar

* Coffee Filter coloured with markers and then clipped in center with clothespin to resemble butterfly

* Pompoms & Googly eyes glued onto clothespin or popsicle stick w/magnet (plus fruit stickers!)


ACTIVITIES:

Caterpillar Obstacle Course (crawling throughout various obstacles like under chairs, through tunnels, over stuff)

Colouring (The author Eric Carle has colouring papes on his website - google it)

Read the Story

Bean Bag Toss (picture of caterpillar and the fruits & vegtables - bags tossed into the holes in the foods)


CAKE:

Butterfly

Caterpillar created from cupcakes

Caterpillar created with Bundt pan

http://www.coolest-birthday-cakes.com/amazing_cake.html

Our Poster (made from her three finger paintings - one dark green, one light green/yellow, one red - then ovals cut and pasted onto bristol board)

and our caterpillar cake!

DECORATIONS:

Red and Green everything (check your Christmas supplies!)

Tablecloth in theme colours (I have a green tablecloth with red apples that will be perfect)

Huge wall caterpillar created with a red balloon and several green ones. Tape or hang these in the birthday area.

Butterfly decorations (will be using some artwork of my daughter and then cutting into butterfly shapes to hang)

LOOT BAGS:

Gummy Worms

Bug Box or Net

Magnifying Glass

Butterfly Stickers or Tattoos

The craft they completed

One of her favourite gifts was a Hungry Caterpillar Jack-in-the-box. She played with it endlessly until it needed to be hidden lol.

Bugs or Flower Garden Birthday Theme

Great theme for any child - boy or girl - and any age! Can be an indoor theme on a cold winters day or an outside party in spring, summer, or fall! Very versatile!

Invitations
Make fun flower garden / bug themed birthday invitations for your party. Your child could make several 8x10 abstract paintings - then cut into a butterfly shape. Write party details on the back. One 8x10 painting could be for two invitations.

Write party details on a recipe card and attach some themed stickers. Hole punch a corner of the recipe card and tie to a plastic flower.


Decorations
Cover the top of the tables with sunny yellow tablecloths (or other vibrant colours)

Add large artificial flowers all over the room

Blow up helium balloons and tie them with long strings of curling ribbon. Attach butterflies, dragonflies or any flying bug to the end of the curling ribbon. Let the balloons float to the ceiling and the butterflies and bugs will “fly” around the party area.

Coffee Filter bugs - let child decorate a coffee filter with bingo dabbers or markers. Scrunch in the middle and clip with clothesline pin. Glue or draw two eyes on clothesline pin. Create several and hang from ceiling or curtain rod.

LADYBUGs: All decorations would be red with black dots.


Activities

Nature Scavenger Hunt. This can be done at a park, lake, pond or backyard. Each guest receives a nature scavenger hunt list and collection items. They then are sent off in pairs or groups to look for the items on their list. Have a prize for the winning team who finds the most items. Give each hunter a gallon size plastic baggie, bucket and spoon (the bucket & shovel might be their loot bag too!) to collect their items.
Scavenger item ideas: pinecones, leaves, white rock, feather, birch bark, etc. You could also hide a few plastic bugs that they are to find.

Pin the bug on the flower. Played just like pin the tail on the donkey only use a large poster of a flower and bug stickers. Buy or draw a flower on a poster board. Make sure the flower has a stem and leaves and doesn't take up more then 10% of the poster. Mark a spot on the flower with a sticker or marker in case more then one player gets their bug on the flower - the player closest to this mark wins. Attach the poster to a wall. Give each party guest a bug sticker with a number written on it. If you can't find stickers then you can make ladybugs and beetles out of construction paper.

Bug Landing (variation of musical chairs). Cut large leaves out of poster board or felt - at least large enough for two children to stand on. Make one leaf per guest. Place the leaves around the floor of the area you will be playing in. Tell birthday guests that they are going to pretend to be bugs. When the music plays they will pretend to fly around the room, but when the music stops they must find a leaf to land on.

If you are giving away prizes: Before the party buy small prizes - enough for each guest - with a bug / flower theme.

Digging for Bugs: Fill a large bucket or shallow rubbermaid container halfway with soil. Add enough water to make it goopy and muddy. Mix in different rubber and plastic bugs & reptiles. Each child gets to dig out an item until all the items have been found. (Have a bucket of soapy water handy!)


Craft Activities

Make bug antenna's with headbands, pipe cleaners and Styrofoam balls.Decorate sunny yellow foam visors to look like flowers.

Paint picture frames green and then paint on bugs or flowers. An easy way to make bugs is to have them dip their index finger in paint and make dots on the frame. Then come back when dry with a small paint brush and paint on dots, eyes and antenna’s. You can also let them decorate the frames with stickers, jewels or foam cut-outs.

Decorate clay pots with paint. Then fill with dirt and add few flower seeds. This makes a great party favor for the guests to take home.

Decoupaged clay pots. Using slightly diluted white glue, let the children paint the glue on the pot and put on small pre-cut squares of fabric scraps. Paint a layer of glue over finished product. Tissue paper also makes a great decoupage medium.

Bug Pet Rocks - Find or buy several very smooth round flat rocks. Let the party guests paint their rocks to look like bugs. Glue on googly eyes if desired. Then let the guests name their pet rocks and take them home for a party favor.


Food

Cut Jell-O jigglers with a bug, butterfly or flower shaped cookie cutter.

Sandwiches cut with flower or bug shaped cookie cutters.

Honey Bee crackers.

Bow tie pasta - it looks like butterfly wings!

Cheese (cut with butterfly cookie cutter) and crackers.

Make dirt / garden cupcakes. Fill individual cupcake liners 1/2 way with chocolate pudding. Crush Oreo cookies and sprinkle them on top of the chocolate pudding to fill the liners. Place gummy worms in the cupcakes and a pretty plastic flower on top. This a also a fun activity for the party goers to make!

Chocolate Pudding cups with a gummy worm or spider

Birthday cake shaped like a caterpillar, butterfly, or a dirt cake (google it for recipe but I think basically a frosted chocolate cake that is then sprinkled with oreo crumbs and gummy bugs)


Party Favors

Bug Nets
Magnifying glass
Plastic bugs
Stickers of flowers and bugs
Small terra cotta pot with a packet of seeds
Small toy rake or hoe
Any item that the birthday party guests have made as a craft

**For instance, the kids painted or decoupaged a clay pot. When it's time to leave, place a baggie of soil, flower seed packet, a baggie of gummy worms, and a thank you note inside the pot. A complete loot bag that will be used rather than tossed because it's all plastic junk! **