Chinese New Year Party: Invites

Mia is turning 11 on the 13th of this month. She decided a few months ago that she wanted some kind of Asian themed party. Once I started looking for ideas I found out that the Chinese New Year falls on February 14th so I thought that would be perfect. Once I told her about it she agreed and was very excited.

So for every party you have to start with the invites because those have to be out at least a week (optimally 2 weeks) before the party. As I was looking for ideas for the invatations I came across this tutorial at alphamom.com showing you how to make your own fortune cookies. Nothing is more fun than cracking open a fortune cookie to find the fortune inside so why not put party info in one to hand out as invites. Not to mention that I like giving invites that have a wow factor. (check out the rainbow party invites)

First I printed out the party info on slips of paper. In MS Publisher I made a box 4" x  5/8". Using the font Seven Monkey Fury I typed out You're Invited to Mia's Chinese New Year Birthday Party on the front and on the back I put in the party info.

Then I made the cookies according to the tutorial except I made mine a little over 4" instead of 5". They are very easy to make once you get the hang of it. As I made my cookies I put the party fortune inside.

 

Then I found a pattern for a Chinese take-out box here. They have a bunch of patterned templets but I just used the blank one at the bottom of the page and printed them on red paper. 

I used brads on the sides to hold it together. I printed a little tag to put the guests name on and took a piece of 8" wire and looped the ends around the brad after slipping on the tag.

 

Then I put in a little bit of plastic wrap and put in  my cookie. Just a note here: if you make your cookies much bigger than 4" then they will not quite fit into the take-out box. 

When the kids get their cookies/invites I hope that they enjoy the wow factor.

Stay tuned more party ideas to come...

linking up with