And now a word from our Sponsors! ... Someone has to pay the bills around here     We hope you are enjoying the Graduation Party Planning newsletters.   This issue focuses on a few of our favorite items that you may want to purchase for your party.     Yard Signs Yard Signs, especially weather-resistant ones, can be put up a few days before to build excitement and to let everyone know about the upcoming party!   Yard signs are a fun way to greet your guests and guide them to your party location. Put them on your front lawn, on the corner of your street, or even at the entranceway of your subdivision!   If you're holding your party in your back yard, you can use yard signs to guide people around the back of your house or through your gate rather than having them come through your house.   Yard signs can be personalized or not. Personalized signs are nice in that they're one more way to honor your graduate. And they're especially helpful if there's more than one graduation party going on in your neighborhood at the same time.   Shindigz.com has several different Yard Signs to choose from including weather-resistant, inflatable, and laminated cardboard. Click here to check out their selection and to order.     Graduation Banners Of course, another type of yard sign is a Graduation Banner. Some banners are weather-resistant so you can easily hang them outside without worrying about the elements.   Banners come in many different sizes and styles and can be personalized or non-personalized so you can use them over and over.   Shindigz has a great selection of graduation-themed, weather-resistant banners that make a fun and easy-to-hang decoration. You can even get banners with your grad's photo on them.   You might think quality banners like this are expensive. But Shindigz has them starting as low as $14.99. Just click here to see their selection or to order.     Gifts Our favorite new item this year has been the Best Buds vase collection.   Our affiliate, Carlson Craft, sells bud vases printed with inspirational messages including "Believe", "Dream", and "Imagine" as well as Graduation Piggy Banks.   Photofetti & Wordfetti Unique alternatives to regular confetti or even graduation-themed confetti are two products called Photofetti and Wordfetti.   Photofetti features photographs of the graduate mixed in with festive confetti.   Wordfetti allows you to customize 1" pieces of confetti with custom sayings that are printed on both sides of the confetti.  Choose from ready-to-use sayings such as "Class of 2007", "Congratulations", "Congrats", "Way to Go", and "We are Proud of You" or create  your own personalized saying.  You can even include your grad's name or your school if you want.   Dress up your Wordfetti with Accent Colors.  For each Accent Color Pack, you can choose up to 3 different colors.   Photofetti and Wordfetti is 1" in diameter and the accent pieces are 1/2" and 3/4".  To find out more about these products and to order, just go to Photofetti.com.     Personalized Water Bottles and Labels Water bottles with personalized labels are a huge hit at Graduation Parties!! They pay tribute to the graduate and are the most popular beverage you can serve! To save on shipping costs we also offer the labels separate from the bottles of water, so you can place them on your own store bought bottles!     Thank you notes After the ceremony; after the party; there is one last detail that the graduate needs to take care of… Sending thank you notes.  It’s customary for the graduate to thank all the people who gave them a graduation gift.   To make this task easier, order personalized thank you notes well in advance of graduation.  And consider ordering the graduation themed return address labels and envelope seals.   Carlson Craft has a good selection of Graduation Thank You cards, return address labels and seals.        Graduation Greeting Cards Have you been invited to lots of graduation parties?   Order a supply of congratulations cards from our online store so you don't have to run to the card store and pay card store prices.   Order some for your graduate to give to their friends, too!     Need more help? Order a copy of Graduation Parties! Everything You Need to Know From Start to Finish available from our website as a book in paper copy or a convenient downloadable version! Click here to find out more about the book.   This 100-page guide provides great advice from experienced moms - like you!    Or visit our website at www.graduationparty.com. It also contains a lot of information including ideas, tips and hints for all your graduation party needs. You can even order unique graduation-themed items such as invitations, decorations, and much, much more.   We will be sending you friendly reminders to help you get organized and avoid the last minute panic. If you do not want to receive these reminders please reply to this e-mail with “take me off your mailing list” in the subject line.   If you have a friend that is planning a graduation party, please forward them this e-mail and suggest they sign-up for our e-newsletter. They can just click here to go to our Newsletter sign-up page.   If you have a burning question that is keeping you up at night, send us an e-mail, we will try to get back to you so you can sleep tonight.   Good luck!!   Ginger Venable ginger@graduationparty.com   PS: All of our newsletters are kept on our website. If you’ve missed an earlier version or if you want to take a peek at the upcoming ones just go to our website, www.graduationparty.com, and click on “E-Newsletters”.