Rock Climbing Gem Party

Rock Climbing Gem/Jewel/Geometric Birthday Party -rock climbing party with DIY gem decor, rock themed dessert table, and favour ideas.

When my daughter Paige turned 12, she decided she’d like a rock climbing gem birthday party to celebrate.  We had an amazing time rock climbing with her friends, and then invited them all back to our house for a “Paige Rocks” celebration.  We used the idea of rocks to inspire a rock/gem/jewel/geometric themed birthday party.

The party was amazing.  It was so much fun to create, and to host.  I hope it inspires you.

Rock Climbing

We started out at our local rock climbing place and the girls got to climb for a few hours together.  Paige loves rock climbing and had an amazing time getting to do it with all her friends.

After the rock climbing was done, we headed back to our house with some tired, hungry and excited girls.

The Rock/Gem/Jewel/Geometric Birthday Party Decorations

We set up the dining room for our guests to enjoy some “rock” inspired treats.  (This was before the big dining room make-over, if you’re wondering why it looks so different now.)

The Table

For our Rock Climbing Gem Birthday Party I made a lot of the decorations with my Cricut machine.  Including the paper 3-D shapes that we used throughout the party as decorations -you can find the free cut file for these here.

I adjusted the size a few times to make some bigger and smaller ones.

The Rock Climbing Party Favours

Each girl, had a special place setting waiting for them.

I used inexpensive muslin bags for the party favours, and customized them with each girl’s name, so they doubled as placards.  To make the bags, I used iron-on gold vinyl and cut it out with the Cricut machine.  They were really easy to make and the girls were very impressed.

Each bag was to hold a little gem necklace -which was the perfect little party favour.

Gem Straws and Candles

I also used my Cricut to make the straw gems.  After we cut out the gem shape on the Cricut, we used hot glue to attach them to the gold paper straws.  We found an inexpensive gem cut file that had two layers, for a few dollars in my Cricut Design Space.  I cut the top layer out of glitter cardstock, and layered it over another piece of cardstock in the party colours.  These little gems turned out so well, I loved them and so did the girls.  I was so impressed with what my Cricut was able to do.

We used the same cut file to create some vinyl adhesives for my candles.  The candles are from the  dollar store, and then we added the gems cut out in gold vinyl.  They looked amazing, and were very easy and inexpensive to make.

Borax Crystals

On the table we also used lots of scattered rocks, gems and crystals.  We collected some rocks on our walks, and found some fun gems at the dollar store.  We also made some pretty crystals out of borax.  This tutorial was our favourite.  It took about a week for us to make them all.  We added some gold paint to some of them too.

We also added some pretty pink flowers, and some geometric gold candle holders.

More Gem Decorations

Over in the entry way, I used a few more of the vinyl gems I cut out on the Cricut machine.  They looked great on the mirror, and easily peeled off after the party.

I also sewed some geometric bunting.  Again I used the Cricut and cut out some simple geometric shapes out of different colours of cardstock and in different sizes.  I used my sewing machine to sew them into a pretty garland –see my tutorial here.  I made a few and used some over the console table too.

To make the geometric shaped honey comb decorations, I cut the round ones before they were unfolded -I love how these turned out and they’re so simple to make.

Rock and Gem Themed Dessert Table

The main attraction of the party was the beautiful rock themed dessert table.  We had so much fun putting it together and the girls just loved it.

The backdrop was made with a simple branch attached to the wall that we hung more of the geometric garland and shapes off of.  The vinyl wall decals were cut with the Cricut machine too.  I used the same gems and layered the vinyl with white on top and, pink and aqua the party colours underneath.  We also made “Paige Rocks” out of the vinyl.  These all looked amazing for the party, and were easy to remove afterward.

The metal geometric shapes were some I used as Christmas decorations, but worked perfectly here.

All the party desserts were rock themed, which was so much fun.

The Cake

The cake was made the week before –you can see how easy it was here, and I just put it in the freezer and took it out the morning of the party.

Paige loved the succulents, so we incorporated them into the party flowers, and just added some pretty rock candy to the cake to tie it into the theme.  It turned out so, so pretty.

I served some fruit in cute little paper cups.

Rock Themed Candy

The rock themed candy was pretty fun to find.  We had classic rock candy.

I also found this fun rock popping candy, that the kids thought was amazing.

And to go with the gems, some candy rings.

One of the prettiest treats of the day, a beautiful plate of donuts.  They sure looked great with their little gem pics!

Over on the other side of the table, more treats.

We made regular rice crispy squares, and cut them into cubes and dipped half on a diagonal into coloured chocolate.  They were simple, looked great, and were so yummy.

We also made some dirt pudding (chocolate pudding with crushed oreos) and topped them with candy rocks, and served them in little mason jars.

I wanted to offer some chips so I picked up a party mix and served them in these sweet little takeout boxes.  I wanted them to match the party, so I used some more of the vinyl decals and added them to the boxes.

Homemade Agate Slice Rock Lollipops

We also made these agate slice rock lollipops.  We used this tutorial to make them out of crushed up candy.  They weren’t too hard to make, and looked amazing.  The tricky part was trying to find colours that we wanted and flavours that went together well.

Tips and Tricks

This party was a huge success.  If you’re considering something similar, I have one little bit of advise.  The rock climbing place also had a party room, and we considered renting it to keep things all in one place, but I’m so glad we didn’t use it, and set everything up at home.  

Hosting part of the party at home meant that we could make it really, really special.  I could set up everything ahead of time, and the 15 min. drive back to our house was no problem at all.  The girls faces when they walked in and saw it all, made it all completely worth while, that’s for sure, and I never would have had time to make it quite so magical if it wasn’t at home.

This is one of those times where the smile on the birthday girl’s face says it all.

With a Rock Climbing Gem Birthday Party, life really is a party!

You might also like our Mermaid Themed Birthday Party here.

Also check out our Rainbow Art Birthday Party here.

You might also like our Ice Cream Themed Birthday Party here.