Michaels Pinterest Party #MPinterestParty

Have you ever been to or hosted a Pinterest party? 

If you don't know, a Pinterest party is where you get together with some friends and spend an evening crafting up a few ideas that you've pinned from Pinterest? (follow my boards here if you'd like!) Well, I have always wanted to do one and when Michaels asked me to host my very own Pinterest Party I was like sign me up. How fun would that be! I love any chance to get together with girlfriends for some kid-free time!

Michaels sent me some really fun red and white decor (Pinterest logo colors) to get the party started...cups, napkins, balloons, etc. And I juuuuust happened to have some red and white fabric leftover from Oliver's Circus Party which perfectly matched the Pinterest logo colors, score! 

Since the party supplies they sent were red and white, how fun would it be fun to theme out the food too. How about some red velvet cupcakes, red velvet cookies, and red licorice in mason jars with white ribbons :-) 

For project ideas I turned to my Pinterest boards of course! I wanted to do projects that any guest could enjoy doing and that would be easy enough to get done in a few hours time. I also wanted the projects to be for any skill level...so they would look great at the most basic level or amped up with all sorts of creativity.

The main project for the party was to make Burlap Pennant Banners.  I love that I was able to find laminated burlap rolls at Michaels in two colors, natural and cream. Did you know that Michaels carried burlap?

I also bought an assortment of stencils, paint, and paint brushes...

And a variety of pretty ribbon choices to hang the banners.

A second project idea for the party was to make cute ruffle-y burlap Christmas trees using cardboard tree forms, burlap, and hot glue.

And I also thought a super easy quick project would be to make glittered clothespins...I just love these things! They are so awesome for gift tags, advent calendars, showcasing Christmas cards, etc. Love. Love. Love.

I hope these ideas inspire you to host your own Pinterest party! It's the perfect time of year to throw one, you can get a bunch of holiday decor made all in one night or how about some of those handmade gift ideas you have been thinking about doing?

Thank you to Michaels for all the inspiration too...I just love wandering those aisles!!

 And here's a few tidbits of info from Michaels...

·         Michaels offers customizable party supplies like cups, napkins and balloons available online to personalize your event

·         Follow the hashtag #MPinterestParty to see how others are making their pins a reality

·         The Michaels Décor Guide has tons of ideas and projects to make spreading the holiday cheer throughout your house easy. Navigate through the online version, download a copy, or pick up one at your local Michaels!

Thanks for stopping by today!

 XOXO,

*Michaels provided a gift card for my party. All opinions are 100% my own.

Simple Halloween Party Decor Ideas

Here are some of fun and inexpensive ways to decorate for a kids' Halloween party that I came up with for a local mommy group's get together they hosted this month!

I made simple goody bags that acted as an activity bag for each kid during the party. I stamped "Happy Halloween" on plain brown kraft bags and filled each one with the all the items needed to make little pom pom spiders for their craft activity.

Inside each bag I placed a smaller clear cello bag full of different sized pom poms and googly eyes, a few pipe cleaners, a straw for their drink, and a cute pipe cleaner pumpkin to take home.

Each table had simple teeny pumpkins in wire baskets with some Halloween colored crinkle paper. I love this stuff!!!

We also put jars of pumpkin wands at each table. Just a stripey straw with one of those marshmallow pumpkins on top! Each jar was tied with a ribbon for a simple centerpiece.

Easy and well within a small budget! 

Some of the activities also included these tattoos I made here. And each child took home these party favors too!

Thanks for stopping by today!

 XOXO,

TUTORIAL: Easy Pom-Pom Firecracker Cupcake Toppers

Today I thought I would bring back a guest post I shared over at I Heat Naptime earlier this summer for Jamielyn's Hello Summer Event!

This tutorial makes a super easy and festive way to jazz up your cupcakes and although especially fun for the  4th of July, my Easy Pom-Pom Firecracker Cupcake Toppers would be great for any celebration by changing the pom-pom colors to coordinate with your theme and colors! So happy cupcake decorating for you all!

Easy Pom-Pom Firecracker Cupcake Toppers

Pom-Pom Maker (I used the Clover 1 3/4 inch and 1 5/8 inch)

Yarn

Scissors

Toothpicks

To make the pom-poms, I used the Clover brand pom-pom makers that you can buy at your local Jo-Anns store.  You can always check out the video I made HERE if you need help with your pom-pom makers.  They are pretty easy to work although I totally get that sometimes the first time using them can be tricky!

You will also need a pair of scissors, some fun yarn colors, and toothpicks!

1. Open up the Pom-Pom maker and wrap the yarn around both "rainbow" sections.
2. Close up the Pom-Pom maker so it is back to it's original look except now you will have yarn wrapped around the outer circle.

3. Take your scissors and cut along the middle of each wrapped section.  Then clip a small piece of yarn (about 6 inches or so) and slide it in between the groove in the middle of the Pom-Pom maker.  Pull it tight and tie it into a knot.

4. Pull the Pom-Pom maker apart.

5. Take out the Pom-Pom and use your scissors to shape it so it is nice and fluffy.

6. Push a toothpick into the center of the Pom-Pom. 

Now decorate your cupcakes or cakes with these sweet little Pom-Pom Firecracker Cupcake Toppers. The perfect decorations for any party!!

DIY Mason Jar Frogs  ::  Gluten Free/Dairy Free Lemon Bars  ::  Crossover Pinafore Pattern

**This post was originally published at I Heart Nap Time on June 25, 2013." See original post HERE.

XOXO,

Oliver's First Birthday Invitation--Free Printable

I wanted to share the invitation I made for Oliver's First Birthday party (seen here) with y'all today.  I created it over at Picmonkey, I just love that site and all their photo editing options! 

I made the invitation using bold circus style stripes with the classic circus colors of red, aqua, and yellow that I designed his party around. Of course, under the "Where" section I put our address...it's ok to leave that stuff off of the inter webs, right?  Riiiight!

If you are throwing a circus party any time soon and would like to use this invitation just click on the picture above for the free blank printable and save it to your desktop.  You can then upload it to Picmonkey or Photoshop or any other photo editing software you are handy with and add in your child's name and all the vital party info in any font of your choosing! I printed all our invitations out over at Vistaprints...the are so easy peasy to work with :-)

I also created these fun labels for Oliver's goodie bags over on Picmonkey too!  You can do so much on that site...LOVE! For these labels, I uploaded them to Avery and printed them off on round Avery labels similar to what I did for Eloise's First Birthday party here.

Okie dokie, hope you are having a swell day!

Thanks for stopping by today!

XOXO,

Oliver's First Birthday: A Circus Party!

As many of you already know, my little guy, Oliver, turned a whole ONE year old in June and we threw him a fun Circus-themed birthday party to celebrate him in style! I'm finally getting his birthday party post up, man, summer just keeps getting busier and busier (ya feel me!) So here is a look at his big day and some of the fun we had!  We had around 50 people come and help us celebrate him (!!) we are so very thankful to have such wonderful friends and family in our lives!

We decided to throw him a Circus Party as Oliver is just such a fun lovin' little dude! The colors were red, aqua blue, and yellow...classic Big Top colors!

With any Big Top Circus lots of stripes were in order!

And we had to have lots of circus-themed food too!  

Cotton candy? Check!  

Hot dogs? Check!

Fresh popped popcorn? Check!

Circus Peanuts? Check!

Animal Cracker?  Check and done!

Don't these foods just scream CIRCUS!

I bought sweet little striped favor bags in circus colors here on Etsy and filled them with animal crackers for the kids' goodie bags.  I made the stickers on my computer to match his invitations...I'll share those with you another day!

We also had a whole table of fun things to play with and also to add to the goodie bag take home fun...self-stick adhesive mustaches (bought here) for everyone (think Strong Man!), cute circus animal face masks (found in the Michaels' Dollar Spot), foam red clown noses (bought here), and giant clown sunglasses.  These were all a huge hit with everyone, adults and kids alike, I'm so glad I went a bit overboard with the decor!

 If you follow me on Instagram you saw Penelope getting a little pre-party cray-cray!

Here's a peek at the table...also included was a super delicious Strawberry Lemonade made with freshly picked strawberries...mmm, so good!

I had to have some red stripey straws...and toy circus animal decor too! ;-)

Here are the other two tables in our screened in porch.  Food...and more food!

I found these awesome and totally coordinating napkins at Ikea...did I ever tell you how much I loved Ikea?

We also offered an amazing Pulled Pork thanks to my awesome sister, Annie! Watermelon slices, coleslaw, macaroni, hotdogs served up in these fun insulated foil bags, chips, and cotton candy in treat cones (template found here).

I had another table set up with freshly popped popcorn...Yum!  I think the popcorn boxes totally made this area a huge hit, the kiddos LOVED them!

I bought store-bought cupcakes (and a smash cake for the little dude) and put them in fun striped cupcake holders.

We were having lots of little ones come to the party so we had a piñata and a bounce house for entertainment as they are always a blast.

I decided to create some cute candy bags for the kids to put their candy in after the piñata was smashed.  I used red striped favor bags and then stamped "Candy 'Stache" on them...get it....mustache = stash!?!?  Har Har!

Oliver just loved hitting the piñata with me! See how proud he looks! And that little round belly of his...gah, so cute!

Noah was the kid that ended up smashing all the candy out of the piñata. I can't believe I actually got a picture of that!

The kids went wild....

It took him a while but Oliver finally got into the actual "smash" part of the cake smash!

I'm so sad that my baby is now ONE, I mean where oh where did this past year go!!  Do y'all remember when he was born (click here to read about it)!  That teeny little 6 lb 10 oz baby is now one, ONE!

I also need to say thank you to all our friends and family, especially my momma and my sister and her husband who timed their travels to Chicago just to be a part of Oliver's party. We are so happy to have such loving people in our lives and to be a part of a his life and to be there for us as we navigate parenthood, cause dang it can be hard! We thank God everyday that He has given us such an amazing and awesome child to care for, he really is the best little boy we could ever ask for!

Thank you so much for stopping by today...I hope this post wasn't picture overkill!  I couldn't help it, this party was just so much fun to plan and there are so many good memories as I look back at all the pictures!

XOXO,