Photo Booth Backdrop: Sneak Peak

This weekend my beautiful niece is celebrating her Quiceanera and I've offered to create a photobooth backdrop and props for the party. When I think about it, I've been preparing for this moment for years -- purchasing stick-on mustaches for a funny family photo while my brother-in-law was deployed (and grew a pretty amusing-looking mustache!), creating photo props for a New Year's Eve party, pinning bunting after bunting and photo backdrop after photo backdrop.

And I'm ready for my debut.

Here are a few sneak peaks! I'm so excited to put it together and really hope it helps make what will surely be a fabulous celebration even more fun.

These are just a few pieces of what I've been working on -- I can't wait to report back next week with photos of the actual backdrop and some fun photos with props!


Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!

Inside Out BREs

I know this has been on Pinterest and craft/design blogs before, but I thought I'd share my own creation here.

Lots of business reply envelopes have really cool patterns inside -- for security purposes. I get business reply envelopes from one business with this very cool pattern inside. I decided to deconstruct them and turn them inside out.

The final product is a really cool-looking design.

Hopefully the recipient will enjoy receiving this quick note inside a cool envelope as much as I enjoyed creating it!

When was the last time you mailed a card, note or letter to someone? Do it! It will make your day and theirs, promise!




Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!

Gift Idea: Seed Bombs

Last weekend, Lucas and I spend about 30 minutes making seed bombs to give out as Christmas gifts. It was inexpensive and fun and I think he and I are both excited to make them again soon.

There are numerous tutorials around the interwebs and you can even buy them on Etsy, but they are so fun to make, I can't imagine buying them!

  The ingredients are simple:

• Air dry terracotta Crayola clay (I also read that if you have clay soil, you an dig down and use that. We do have clay soil but didn't want to get that DIY in our first attempt!

• Potting soil or compost (we used potting soil we had on hand)
• Seeds -- native perennials are best; we used a perennial wildflower mix
• Water

Our process was highly scientific: we combined several small garden spade scoops of potting soil and clumps of clay until it looked like about 2/3 soil and 1/3 clay. We added enough water to get it all nice and squishy (maybe one cup?). Then we dumped in the packet of seeds.


Next comes the fun part when you're a 6yo boy -- squishing it all up!

I believe it was right about now that Lucas proclaimed, "Dirt is my middle name!"

Once it was sufficiently squished and mixed together we formed round balls. You can make these any size you want. Most of ours were a little smaller than a ping pong ball.

I carefully loaded them up on a sturdy piece of cardboard and put them on the only flat surface in our house that is safely out of reach of Nathaniel "hurricane is my middle name" -- the top of the fridge! Within about 48 hours they were dry and completely hard.

Warning: You may want to let anyone in your house who can reach the flat surface you are drying your seed bombs on that they are little balls of dirt, clay and seeds.

Abel -- who knew we had done this project but had not been around for it -- mistook the seed bombs for truffles (which I've never made in my life!) and apparently took a big bite. I SO wish I had been there to see it! I think I laughed harder than I have in a year when he told me that story!



I packaged them up six per bag with cute labels that said:

Seed Bombs -- Handmade by Lucas 

Drop a seed bomb anywhere you think needs a little beautification!

Ingredients: Potting soil, clay, perennial wildflower seeds


It's my understanding from reading other tutorials that the clay protects the seeds from being eaten by birds or other animals. The clay will continue to protect the seeds until they sprout and break the clay apart on their own. We made about 30 this round and will be giving them all away, but I think it would be fun to make a batch for us to keep in the car and use for guerrilla beautification!


Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!

Simple Easter Mantle

Abel and the boys were gone last night for a quick overnight trip and I was looking forward to getting out our Easter decorations. We don't have much, but do have a few cute things. I was SO bummed when I realized that the Easter box was in our attic and not our basement storage room. Our attic is accessible via an opening in our bedroom closet and not only is it a real hassle to access, it would be nearly impossible for me to do it on my own.

What do to? What to do?

I ended up putting together this sweet and simple mantle decor in about 30 minutes. I love it!

The eggs are the backs of my lovely-but-outdated Moo business cards. I've held onto them because those designs are so beautiful and I knew I'd use them somewhere. I picked out about six of the most springy designs and free-hand cut them into egg shapes. Then I taped them onto some yellow and white baker's twine. (I still have at least 50 cards left -- can't wait for inspiration to strike again!)

Then I filled up two mason jars with colorful jelly beans and a third with some green paper filler.

I'll have to enjoy it while I can -- as soon as the boys are back they'll be clamoring for those jelly beans!!

In case you're curious, the photo on the left is of Abel's maternal grandparents on their wedding day. The one on the right is of the hotel my paternal grandfather owned. I love having two beautiful pieces of family history on display!

Original post by Smiling Mama. Thanks for reading!