Gloves, Hats, and Necklaces - Craft Ideas for Tea Parties

by Lauri Griffin | More from this Blogger

24 Mar 2008 08:49 AM

What's a tea party without gloves? I have several ideas for decorating gloves, depending on the age group of your guests and how many adult helpers you have. If you are lucky you can sometimes find old dress gloves at thrift stores and garage sales. If you can't find them or don't want to glue things to almost antique clothing, gloves meant for keeping lotion on your hands, or those one size fits all stretch gloves that cost about a dollar work just fine too.

Plain gloves are fine and will feel fancy to the children. But gloves with decorations around the wrist are extra special. The easiest way to decorate a glove is to put stickers on it. Craft stores now have three dimensional shiny jewels, ribbons, and flower stickers that would look darling on the wrist of a glove. The stores also have lots of vintage looking stickers with things like typewriter keys, flower embellished alphabets, birds, and lockets. Place a lot of sticker pages on the table, give each guest a pair of gloves and let them decorate! Leftover stickers can be temporary earrings.

If your guests are a little older, and you have more time and helpers, consider using buttons to decorate the gloves. The children can sew ribbons and buttons around the cuff of the glove, or adults can use hot glue to attach the buttons. You can also use the same techniques with hats. Also consider scraps of lace or tulle, and lengths of ribbons. Some party stores even have inexpensive straw hats to give out as favors.

For extra jewelry, get heavy string and some inexpensive plastic beads. Pony beads and plastic string are great for young children. Tie one bead on the end of a length of string and let the children string their beads. Make sure the string is plenty long to go over the head. The stiff plastic doubles as a needle so you don't have to worry about threading needles or the children getting poked. Tie the lengths together once they've strung the beads. Older children will love to use smaller beads and needles and thread and design their own jewelry. If you are using nice beads, bracelets take a lot fewer beads than necklaces! The craft stores often have beads and beginning bead kits on a ½ price sale.

What's really great about these projects is that they double as a send home treat. If your guests leave with a special hat, necklace, and gloves to take home I don't think anyone will need a treat bag.

Also See:

Birthday Sandwiches for Tea Party

Birthday Cake Ideas for a Tea Party

Tea Party Birthday Parties

Learn more about Lauri Griffin

Lauri lives in Colorado with her husband and three sons. Amidst all the laundry and packing of lunches, she tries to keep parenting fun.

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