Birthday Ideas in an Oriental Trading book, there is balloon animal kit, cake in a jar, party hats, streamers, confetti, noise makers, get some of the Little Debbies cakes and candles, traditional birthday banner, party favors, noisemakers of course, confetti, balloons, filling space with shredded colored tissue paper (red, white & blue or camo colors to keep with the theme so to speak), hard candy, and bubblegum, camo napkins, plates (seen them at party supply stores and craft stores) party games like pen the tail on the donkey

Christmas Ideas: how about a Christmas card swap, I know postage would be a little more but soldiers would be bombarded with cards across the nation, those little Christmas trees that they sell in all of the mail order catalogs (Lillian Vernon, etc.) that come with their own ornaments, mini Christmas stockings and candy canes or those little candy bags of coal (bubble gum ones), the green and red M&Ms for the holidays, an Advent Calendar box, Oriental Trading Company has these. They are little pine trees (about 4" tall) that have a mineral solution on them (I'm going by memory here, I have a whole bag upstairs in a closet but am too lazy to dig them out). You add water to the little base, and these color mineral salts "grow" on the tree and look like colored snow and decorations

Halloween Ideas: A gingerbread haunted house ( all precut and ready to go), goodie bags full of candy, plastic carved pumpkins, a Tootsie Roll pop covered with tissue to look like a ghost, apple cider packets, candy corn

Thanksgiving Ideas: Turkey Jerky, dried cranberries I think they are called Craisens?, if you check a good candy store there are some candies called Peas n Carrots ( they are round green balls and small orange squares ), candy corn, beef jerky or summer sausage = venison, potato chips = potatoes, canned veggies = veggies, dried fruits and assorted mixed nuts are themselves assorted crackers or breadsticks = asst. breads, hostess fruit pies for the pies, cupcakes for cakes, you could even send some caramel sauce with shortbread cookies for the gravy! and send it in one of those cheapy cornucopia baskets from the craft stores and stick some plastic or silk colored leaves around it and write a note on a nice autumn looking picture postcard ! If you have kids - or access to some, you can do some Thanksgiving crafts. The old trace-you-hand and color turkey comes to mind, instant mashed potatoes, many of the big candle companies make scented candles that would fit this theme and Thanksgiving also, for example, Yankee has Harvest, Cranberry Chutney, Apple Cider, Autumn Lodge, Pumpkin Pie, and Spiced Pumpkin

St Patricks Day Ideas green beanie baby, green jelly beans, instant irish coffee, rice krispie treats dyed green, potato soup, green sugar 4 leaf clover cookies, Irish Spring soap, Pert Shampoo, taste the rainbow of "skittles",Lucky Charms cereal, sour cream and onion Pringels, small toys from Oriental trading company or your local party store, gum in green wrappers, green dental floss, green toothbrush,guacamole chips,

We are always looking for new ideas. If you have any new ideas please send me an e-mail.