Wrapping up the auntie duties, I made a birthday hat for my niece and 14 tissue paper flowers for party decorations.

Hat materials:

• 1 sheet of patterned cardstock
• 1 boa
• 1 cut out number
• Ribbon

Flower materials:

• 16 sheets of tissue paper for large flowers
• 8 sheets of tissue paper for small flowers
• Floral wire or pipe cleaners
• Ribbon or fishing wire

Supplies/tools:

• Sharp scissors
• Glue
• Hot glue gun
• Hole puncher

For the hat, I started with a template and cut it shorter from the bottom since it needed to fit a baby’s head. Cut out the birthday age and glue it to the center. Using the hot glue gun, glue the pink boa along the bottom of the hat and add a puff of the boa to the top. Punch out a hole on each side of the hat to loop ribbon through. This is an easy project, but I did burn myself with the hot glue gun so be careful! Here’s my niece with the hat although it didn’t stay there for very long:

I’ve seen the tissue paper flowers everywhere so decided to make some for the party. Follow Martha Stewart’s instructions except use 14-16 sheets of tissue paper for large flowers and 8-10 for small/medium flowers. I found Party City to have the most choices for tissue paper colors. Other crafters have used pipe cleaners instead of floral wire but any kind of malleable wire will do. I shipped the flowers flat and puffed them when I arrived, using this youtube video. White, light pink, and hot pink flowers are grouped together and hung on white ribbon for pretty displays. These are simple to make but invest in some very sharp scissors because the cutting is the most challenging step.