we had the best first in july this year.  it was a wonderful weekend filled with great friends, too much food, beaches, games, late nights, hot dog and marshmellow roasting, lots of red white and blue, fireworks, freezing waterparks, finishing eachother’s sentences (lol, guys!) and america’s favorite pasttime.  it was the perfect way to start the month!  and we’re lucky because we get to end it the same way!!  hurry back allemans!  we are anxiously counting the days until you return!!!

i got the bright idea to make all the kids matching shirts at about 10pm friday night.  after a trip to walmart and target to get everyone shirts and supplies, cute and crafty skye arrived to help me finish…thank goodness, otherwise it would have meant going to bed at 4am instead of 2am!!   but i do have to say…they turned out so cute!!!  thanks to the  fun idea from “i am momma, hear me roar” (click for the tutorial) i changed it up a bit for the shirts we were using and think they turned out so fun!  and i can’t for the life of me find where i saw the little girls shirts, but it was simply red jersey fabric (an old t-shirt) ruffled up and stitched on to a white t-shirt with a blue square of fabric.  so fun! (something’s up with the colors in these and photoshop is being wierd.  i’m too lazy to figure it out so they are being posted as is. )

have a great day!
-t

You know me, when somebody says party my brain goes into overdrive!!   When planning a party I always think about a theme first.  Whether that theme is a color palette or a style doesn’t matter….just something that makes bringing everything else together easier.  I immediately thought of a vintage baby boy theme since I have some cool vintage glass plates and cups that I have been DYING to have an excuse to use, so this was perfect!   You can find them pretty easily at most antique stores.

I found this cute little shop online, Pretty Little Studio, that makes the most adorable vintage baby flashcards and all kinds of fun stuff.  I had her custom make some invitations for me and I think they turned out SO cute!!

We served simple breakfast foods that were yummy…a parfait bar with yogurt, fresh berries and granola, bite sized cinnamon rolls and other pastries, and a yummy drink.  To go along with the theme I made a little label for each food item

I just made them in photoshop and printed them out on cute scrapbook paper.  I also made one for the gift table:

Now my favorite part…the favors!!   John thinks I’m crazy because I spend hours making things like this, but this is honestly the most fun part for me.   These are very easy and inexpensive to make, but they are time consuming.  If you have the time and love to be crafty then these are perfect for you!

to make the giant cookies find the recipe here

for the bags you will need:

a roll of parchment paper

thread

a sewing machine

ribbon

a hole punch

pinking shears

any deocrations you want for the bags

Cut parchment paper into 6.5×14″ strips.  fold in half and stitch the sides up using a colorful thread and a zig-zag stitch.   trim off the excess on the sides with the pinking shears.  slip a cookie into the pouch.  fold the top of the bag over and punch two holes at the top about an inch apart.  feed the ribbon through the holes and tie into a bow on the front sideof your bag.  decorate as you like.

like I said, pretty easy, just time consuming but I think the result is WELL worth it!

It’s easy to do this for any shower boy or girl, or even if you don’t know what it is just make a mix of boy and girl vintage tags!   It would also be cute for a little girl’s birthday party if you played some vintage games and added a few more decorations and changed the food a bit!

Hopefully that gets your creative juices flowing for your next party!

Have a great day!
-t

Remember my quest to be more organized this summer??  I think I may have just managed to do it!!  And, it’s not too late for you either!  I have come up with something that I’m hoping will give the kids something fun to look forward to every day and keep the summer a little exciting and fresh…all while still being easy for me to accomplish!!  Whew!  A tall order, I know.

So, here it is…the Summer Fun Advent Calendar

The idea behind it is simple.  Give the kids something fun to look forward to everyday…it can be something little that takes 5 minutes, or an all day activity.  The key is to mix it up.  But, the biggest excitement of all is that it’s kept a secret until the day of.  They are left wondering each day what the next day’s activity will be.  So far, so good in our house!   The beauty of it for us moms is that it’s totally changeable if something comes up…because it’s a SECRET and a WHITE BOARD you can change activities to fit your schedule as unexpected things come up without the kids knowing anything about it!   I’ve also devised a system to prevent arguments between kids as far as who gets to reveal the day’s activity.  By making the squares with numbers you can assign odd/even days if you have two kids, and by making them different colors you can assign colors for more than two kids! 

Here’s what you’ll need to make your very own:

Dry erase generic calendar (I got mine at walmart for $7.88)

A dry erase marker

alphabet stickers

number stickers

8 sheets of cardstock (any colors you want)

I think the instructions are pretty clear just by looking at the picture.  Just make a fun header and title for it…you can definitely customize the whole thing…it does NOT need to look just like mine that’s for sure!    Add your activites under each day, stick your paper on with a piece of tape and wa-la! 

Now…the impotant part…coming up with the activities.  Like I said, some activities may take all day, some may take 5 minutes.  The important part is just to give the kids something to look forward to and something that they know they are doing that day to hopefully prevent them from asking you all day!!

I divided my activities up into categories:  in the kitchen, crafts, outings, and fun around the neighborhood.  I also tried to keep things very inexpensive or free to help keep costs down.  Here are some suggesstions to get you started:

make popsicles

get a slurpee

have a waterballoon toss

run through the sprinklers

tissue paper art

corn syrup painting

make ice cream

go to the pool

go to the library

make tin can phones

have a lemonade stand

beach

free movies at the park

dollar tuesdays at Baskin Robbins

silly string fight

bonfire and smores

bowling

sprinkler park

make a fort

have a picnic

movie night

play a game

water guns

make iron on shirts

that’s enough to get you through a whole month!! (I only did M-F since we often have other things going on on the weekends)  The best part is you can repeat many of these things!  Who doesn’t want to have a waterballoon toss  or go to the pool more than once during the summer???   Hopefully this will help make your summer fun and easy and minimize the curse of summertime boredom!!

I would love to hear fun ideas for things that you find in your community.  Leave a comment with any suggestions you have here on this post so we can help each other come up with stuff!!

Have a great day!

-t

I have had MANY requests for a summer session of {Picture Perfect} while the kids are out of school and schedules are more flexible.  So…sign ups are now open for the summer session which begins June 28th.  You can register  HERE.   Spots for this session have already started filling without me even officially announcing it yet…so they will go fast! 

For those of you headed out on vacations and such and worried about timing, I want you to know that these are VERY flexible classes.  You can watch them at any time during the six week period (I usually leave access to the videos up for a few extra weeks for you too, so you can catch up) you can watch them as many times as you like, AND there is a pdf each week of the lecture with all the info and picture examples so you can print it out to keep and reference forever.  Just for those of you concerned about missing a week!

And just because I can’t post anything with out a picture…here’s a little sneak of  a  baby shower from this weekend.  vintage little boy theme…so fun.  more details and pics to come!

have a great day!
-t

Andy has Friday off for his birthday (at least that’s what he thinks…actually it’s for Good Friday, but when you’re 7 it’s more fun to think it’s for your birthday! ) so I’ve been trying to come up with some fun Easter ideas todo that day.  Here are a few of my favorites so far:

from Ladies Home Journal the bunny pop…if you don’t want to go through the hassle/mess of making rice krispie treats omit the first four ingredients.  Pre-made rice krispie treats make these a breeze!!

Ingredients

•    Vegetable cooking spray
• 10  cups Rice Krispies® or any crisped-rice cereal
• 2  packages (10 oz each) marshmallows
• 6  tablespoons butter
• 1  lb semisweet chocolate, melted
• 1- 1/4  lbs white chocolate, melted
•    Red food coloring
•   30 popsicle sticks

And finally, Andy came home with one of these today and I was in love.  John has a REAL weakness for these things.  I don’t particularly care for them, but when I saw this idea I HAD to share it because it’s pretty stinkin cute best of all there’s a free download so you can make your own!  Download them here

I’ve got a few more things up my sleeve…stay tuned!

Have a great day!

-t

I am NOT a huge editor.  I prefer to know my camera and do my best to nail the shot without the aid of photoshop.  That being said, I do adjust ALL of my photos…just minorly.  There is something to be said (in my opinion) for making the image shine just a little bit more with two simple and quick tricks. 

The two most used combinations on my computer are control M and control U.  If you’re a Mac user they would be apple M and apple U for you.  Control M will adjust your curves (or the brighness of your image) and control U controls the hue/saturation of your image.  By nudging these measurements ever so slightly you can make a HUGE difference in your images. 

See what I mean???

The image on the left is my sooc image (straight out of camera) and the on on the right has a teeny bit of tweaking with those two measurements.  Pretty big difference, huh?  Give it a try and let me know what you think!

Have a great weekend!
-t

I think these last several years of attending and shooting elaborate parties have taught me that kids are really very happy with the simple pleasures.   Sure, they love bounce houses and ponies and magicians, (and I love to plan paties like that!!!) but put a table full of goodies in front of them and let them decorate a homemade cupcake and they are JUST as happy.  Just something to keep in mind for those of you planning birthday’s in the near future…that would be me.

Enjoy this gorgeous party!

Mom attended to every gorgeous detail…LOVE the white hydrangeas in a lime green ribbon wrapped box!

the butterflies on the straws…Stunning!

cute little bowls to hold the goodies courtesey of Anthropologie

the darling birthday princess

a finished masterpiece

i LOVE the lighting in these shots…YUM!!!  after decorating cupcakes the kids gathered to make bead necklaces on PIPE CLEANERS.  Genius!!  For little kids they stay stiff enough for them to feed the beads onto…great tip to remember!!  You can then twist multiple strands together to make a necklace that’s long enough.

Hope you’re feeling inspired to plan your next event!

Have a great day!
-t

This year my valentines have taken on a beach theme.  I didn’t really plan it, I was just working around things that I had around the house.  I’m fortunate in that both of my kids are at small schools with teeny classes…so I can make slightly more elaborate things without breaking the bank.  I definitely wouldn’t be doing these things for  a class of 35, but they are fun for the special valentines your kids may have.   The other thing I love about these is that they are both great for boys.  Girls are easy, because they can give things that are in primary colors and nobody thnks anything of it, but boys are hard.  So much of the valentine’s stuff out there is pink and purple and mushy.  I’m happy to say these are BOTH great for the little guys (and gals) in your life.

i dig u

i hit the dollar bins at michaels and found some cute shovels to make these with.  Here’s what you’ll need:

-inexpensive shovels

-small clear bags of some sort (clearbags.com is a GREAT source for celophane bags of all sorts.  you have to buy them in bulk, but they are relatively inexpensive and i use them for EVERYTHING!!)

-candy(i bought cady that had wrappers that were in primary colors so they would match my shovels…something to think about.  it’s a sickness…I know. )

-ribbon

-cut out heart shapes (an extra large heart punch or die cut machine of some sort works great for these!)

-alphabet stamps (or you can print on the paper with your computer before you punch out the hearts)

-a hole punch

-scissors

-tape

1. put you candy in the bags and seal.  punch two holes at the top of the bag about an inch or so apart.

2. string ribbon through hole on the right

3. place candy bag in your shovel and wrap the ribbon around the back of the shovel handle.

4. pull ribbon from behind shovel handle through the hole on the left hand side ofthe candy bag to bring the ribbon together in the front so you can tie a bow.

5. cut out your hearts and stamp with “i dig u”

6. tape hearts to front of candy bag

7. hand out and enjoy!

have a ball, valentine

supplies:

-beach balls

-tags

-ribbon

-string (i used embroidery thread)

-tape

-hole punch

these are super easy!  i found my beach balls at walmart for 77 cents each.  my ribbon is from a giant spool at costco and the tags I made in about 5 minutes in photoshop…good news…here’s a free download of the tags for your own use!

Have a Ball

1. take beach balls out of their package and roll up.  tape into place.

2. tie ribbon around balls

3. cut out your tags and punch a hole in the top

3. use the string to tie your tags around the knot in the bow to secure them to the balls.

done!

Hope you have a happy valentine’s day!!

-t

Grab some scraps of paper and ribbon, some tape and a heart punch and you’ve got yourself some homemade valentines in minutes…

Thanks to inchmark for the cute idea!

Have a great Thursday!!

-t