Seasons > Resources
Family Fun is a great site for any season if children are involved. It has tons of fun crafts and games and decorating ideas with photos, instructions, downloadable patterns and activity sheets, and some short instructional videos. It has lots and lots of birthday party ideas for themes, games, decorations, food, cakes, etc. I highly recommend this site for all parents and Sunday school workers. They also publish a magazine by the same name.
Celebrations is a website that has lots of pretty photos, though I would like to see fewer stock photos and more that go with the ideas. This site has ideas for celebrations for teens and adults as well as some for kids--for food, decorations, and games, including graduation parties, wedding showers and baby shower ideas. It does link you to sites that sell goods, but it opens a new window so you can return to their site by closing the window.
http://www.celebrations.com/birthdayparty
The Woman’s Day site has lots of fun seasonal ideas, too, but is not nearly as kid-focused as Family Fun. The seasonal ideas are only available during that season rather than year round. They used to have amazing cakes, but recently I have not been able to find them on their site.
Martha Stewart Living is a site that has a lot of ideas that are viewable year round, so I like to look at the site for inspiration. However, many of the projects use expensive materials, so I have actually used few of the ideas there.
Oriental Trading Company has lots of inexpensive seasonal decorations, craft sets, and trinkets good for favor bags or prizes for birthday parties and Sunday schools, VBS, and Bible clubs. They do ship to other countries, though you cannot order on line--you have to order by phone or mail. We have always gotten the goods within a week of ordering.
http://www.orientaltrading.com/
Terry’s village has inexpensive seasonal decorations that are nice for the home or church. This is a branch of the Oriental trading company, but the items here are more expensive and nicer than most of the things sold through the Oriental Trading Company.
Websites good for seasonal and birthday ideas: decorations, food, crafts, and games
Websites good for ordering seasonal items
Websites good for seasonal craft ideas
Websites with seasonal craft ideas, but they also sell craft materials, so they are promoting their products. As long as you know that, you can find inspiration and how-to for crafts.
Craft Ideas is a good free craft idea site. It has seasonal craft, crafts for kids, and crafts listed according to the materials used. It can be hard to distinguish google ads from the crafts on this site.
About .com is a good site to learn how to do just about anything. They do have craft ideas for kids, too (489 craft projects for Christmas, 155 for Easter, 1406 for Halloween, 52 for Mother’s Day, and 80 for Father’s Day, etc. You can also look for craft projects by age or craft material, etc--just look for “Browse Topics.”)
http://familycrafts.about.com/
You would think that it would be easy to find good craft sites, but it is not! The problems I have encountered: 1) you have to pay for the ideas, or 2) the crafts are so ugly you wonder why anyone would want to make them, or 3) they have no photos, so you have no reason to want to read their instructions, or 4) they send you all over the internet for projects on other sites. These are 2 sites that i can recommend:
Michael’s is a good all round craft source, and it does sell the products that I mention in my website. This site does have quite a few craft projects, though most of them do not appeal to me.
http://www.michaels.com/seasons-and-celebrations
Ben Franklin is also a good all round craft source, and it does sell the products that I mention in my website. It does have quite a few craft projects, but the site is hard to find your way around.
http://www.benfranklinstores.com/
Crayola does have a lot craft projects for kids, but again, they are promoting their products.
http://www.crayola.com/crafts/
Hobby Lobby used to be the best craft store site that had project ideas. But the way they have the website organized now, you have to download the ideas before you can see them, so I don’t like this site for craft ideas. However, it does sell the products that I mention in my website. I really like the store if you have one nearby--especially since they have super sales on seasonal items after the season is over.
http://www.hobbylobby.com/project_inspiration/project_inspiration.cfm
Amazing Moms is not actually selling products, but they link to other sites that are selling products without really warning you that you are leaving their site.