Making Handmade Party Invitations Inspired by Nature

If you've ever been lucky enough to receive handmade party invitations you would know how delightful they are and how excited they made you feel. Wedding invitations with their delicate layers of paper and decorative ribbons and buckles are a perfect example, they tell you how romantic and classy a wedding will be. For children the feelings are just the same; a fun, original invitation tells them this party is special and helps build their enthusiasm for the big day that is coming.

Naturally receiving invitations is an exciting event for all of us, especially our children, but you will find that with handmade party invitations the gift is also in the giving. Of course it takes some time and effort to put together such thoughtful invites, but the proud as punch smile on your little ones face as they pass them out to their excited little friends is worth every fiddlesome tricky moment.

So, how exactly does nature inspire handmade party invitations? Look around you and you will see that nature provides many useful items that are just perfect for invitations.

Here are a couple of examples:

1. Last summer my daughter wanted a casual beach party for her birthday. The beach party is an easy one to make invitations for, you can write them on the back of a flip flop, put a note in an old bottle with sand. But we'd already done those before. Shells are great for writing on or hiding messages inside too, but we had done that for my husbands 40th birthday Luau, so I wanted to come up with something new. The idea came to me when I wasn't even thinking about it. We were at the beach one day and we were writing messages in the sand, as you do. Ahah! The idea just popped into my head, write the invitation in the sand. It was a perfect excuse to do a bit of beachcombing so off we went and collected a variety of beach treasures, shells, weed, driftwood and frosted glass. We wrote 'You're invited to Jessica's Beach Party' in the sand, scattered the results of our beachcombing efforts artistically around the message and simply photographed it. The result was lovely. The photos were printed at home on the computer and then the rest of the invitation details printed on some nice card stock and glued to the back.

2. I love fairy parties and throw them all the time, so when doing so I think fairy, where do they live what do they do? When asked recently to come up with some original invitations for a fairy party I did just that. Fairies essentially are thought to live in the woods where they flutter about camouflaged by nature. Surely if fairies themselves were throwing a party they would write their invitations on little leaves? How convenient that it was autumn and the time of year when beautiful leaves are abundant. I collected a pile of suitable ones from a nearby park and then it was simply a case of writing the invitation on the leaf with a fountain pen in tiny fairy handwriting. The effect was completely charming.

Here's one more important point to consider. Collecting items to use for hand made party invitations is not only unique and creative but also completely free. Large scallop shells work wonderfully for a beach or mermaid party and can easily be painted or simply written on with a marker pen. Strips of bark or tropical green leaves are perfect for a jungle party, even a coconut, whilst not free unless you live in tropical climes, can be used to contain an invitation to a tropical luau.

So, next time you're throwing a party, stop for a moment and think DIY. Sure you could send out the usual paper invitations, and lets be honest, there really are some gorgeous ones on the market today, but why not have a go at making them yourself, let nature be your guide, the cost is often negligent, but the fun you'll have collecting and constructing the invites with your child will be a memory that will last forever.