With my whole family vaccinated AND post catching COVID despite that fact, we decided to go all in on my son's 8th birthday this year. The last big birthday we celebrated was his 6th mere weeks before the pandemic began. He requested a shark themed party so I did my best to make it happen in the dead of winter in Colorado.

Starting with the location, it took a bit of sleuthing but I finally managed to find an indoor pool that allowed birthday parties. The location was a swimming school and turned out to be a fabulous venue. They had fun murals all over the walls and TONS of water toys. They also provided tables for food and gifts and two life guards for the pool who played with and monitored all of the guests for us.

For the invites I headed to Canva and got to creating. I wanted to impart the vibe in a fun way and I think they turned out great. After designing them I sent them for same day pickup to Walgreens. (there was a backside with all the deets too)

Once the overall plan was made I set to work on the details by heading to Pinterest of course! I went all in on fun themed food and ordered trinkets for goody boxes. Unlike other parties held at my home in the past, this party didn't require games and activities for the guests so once I figured out the food and party favors I was done! 

I made the shark cake with two boxes of cake mix, store bought white icing that I dyed various shades of blue and a shark hand puppet stuffed with paper towels. I followed a tutorial for the shark watermelon, hot glued googly eyes to toothpicks for the crab croissant sandwiches and attempted to make ocean jell-o with gummy sharks but it was an epic fail. I ran out of jell-o and had to scavenge for more in my pantry but it was the wrong color. So, I added blue food coloring but it turned out purple because it was red and yellow jell-o mixed together. There was supposed to be a graham cracker sand bottom but when I added the jell-o it floated and because the space was warm the whipped cream went flat. But, it was tasty and I created a new flavor of jell-o: lemon, strawberry, blue-raspberry.

​It was a very fun party that took way less effort than most other parties I have planned which was good because I've been experiencing vertigo and functioning has been interesting.

I hope you enjoyed looking at my pictures! Thanks for visiting!

I've been wanting a large scale art piece for my new living room since moving in but was waiting until I found something I loved. When I found this pin on Pinterest I knew it was the winner!

The key to this look in my opinion are the square shaped frames. It's unusual and custom looking. So, I set to work finding the frames first and was successful on Amazon. I purchased two packs of four and one single of these.

Once I had the frames it was time to make the art. I bought a bunch of black poster board from the dollar store and a huge roll of white paper from the craft store that is usually used for bulletin boards. Then I wrapped the cardboard backing of each frame with the white paper for my base. Then I used a ruler and pencil to draw lines and make straight cuts into shapes. I ended up just going with whatever shapes I wanted and didn't try to copy the original shapes. The biggest thing was to make sure they weren't too big for the frame. After I cut all of the shapes I used a regular glue stick to glue the black paper cuts onto the white paper and popped them into their frames.

Hanging them was done by my husband and was apparently a chore. But, they look pretty fab and I'm in love!

We've been hosting Cookie Fest every year since we were college babies and this year it got a bit of a make-over. My new friend group is much more into all of the craftiness that I love and are definitely competitive se we went all in on Cookie Fest in regards to the competition element this year. I made rubrics, a trophy, certificates for the winners and we had rules. It was a ton of fun and we ended up with some delicious cookies. 

I love offering a custom cocktail and this year it was a masala chai digestive aid cocktail and let me tell you...it was BOMB! I printed out directions so everyone could make their own and I wouldn't be a drink mixer slave all evening. You can get the printable recipe below.

We use a TON of butter every year at cookie fest and this year was no exception. Look at that mountain of butter!

After the baking ended and the winners were declared by the judges, all guests took home cookies in containers I purchased at the dollar tree and a custom oven mitt that I created using the template linked below. You can edit and make it your own by clicking the image.

This is a fun way to gift your teacher at Christmas time! Give them a punch out countdown calendar for the days leading up to Christmas break. Place goodies inside each cup, cover with tissue paper and add a number. It's easy, adorable and will definitely get the teacher excited!

You will need: 
- foam board
- tissue paper
- paper cups
- small gifts

How to Make it:
1. Hot glue cups onto foam board with opening facing out. I placed mine in a tree shape and decorated it to look like a tree but you could make it look like anything.
2. Add gifts to cups.
3. Use a rubber band to hold a small square of tissue paper on top of the cup opening.
4. Decorate as you like.

I love gifting my co-workers at Christmas time but the struggle is finding something simple enough and inexpensive enough to gift to 50 people. This year I made simmer pot's in a bag and they turned out so cute! You can watch the full how to on my TikTok: @rennaissance.rachel and go ahead and follow me while your there! You can download the free tag by clicking the image below!

To make it all you will need are:
- oranges
- cinnamon sticks
- evergreen branches or rosemary
- cloves
- ribbon
- clear plastic bags
- free printable tag (below)

Halloween was definitely eventful this year. Derek and I had a total of three different costumes for Halloween including a recycled costume from several years ago and two new ones. The kids all had two costumes each and we all had a serious blast.

We started the festivities on Friday with school parties. I went as the Cheshire Cat and reused an older costume from several years ago when we were Alice in Wonderland themed. Lilly also chose an Alice in Wonderland character but went for The Mad Hatter instead of Alice and we had to build her costume using random awesomeness from Goodwill. Arthur went as Beetlejuice which was comprised of a suit from Amazon, green hair paint and makeup. Alan went as a ninja and took very little extra work which I appreciated.

That evening we went to Boo at the Zoo and kept our costumes from school with the addition of Derek as a banana.

Saturday I spent the day cleaning up the house and finishing up costumes for Sunday. That evening we went to a Halloween party with friends and the kids had a sitter. I was super proud of our costumes and put considerable effort into them. Derek was the singer Sia and I was a chandelier. He went all the way wearing a skirt and heels. It was phenomenal.
For my chandelier costume I roamed through Hobby Lobby looking for anything silver that I thought would work. I purchased a black tshirt, silver leather, some felt, silver gems and silver beading and ribbon from the ribbon section. I referred to a sketch of a chandelier and started hot-gluing. I ended up making a choker out of the jeweled ribbon and hot-glued the beading to it and the shirt. I even cut slits and inserted some battery pack lights to electrify it. I found a silver wig and silver sequin pants on amazon and the outfit was complete. For Sia, I made the bow out of a headband blank, black craft foam and hot glue. Purchased the wig from amazon and then dressed him in m clothes. Yes...unfortunately we wear the same size. ​

For the actual day we spent quite a bit of time recovering from Saturday's party which involved us arriving home at 3:30am. But, once I was rehydrated with two Body Armor Drinks and filled with a breakfast burrito I was ready for the day. We carved pumpkins and watched The Addams Family to get ourselves into character. Then we donned our family costumes and totally killed it! I made it easy on myself this year and most of our costumes were just purchased items put together. I did go hunting for Derek's jacket at Goodwill because I didn't like the costume options online and I had to make Alan's Cousin It costume from scratch but, it was actually pretty quick.

To make it I took a tan baseball cap and cut off the brim. Then I measured yarn for the correct length for Alan (didn't want it dragging the ground). Then I hot-glued two layers of said yarn around the rim of the cap and then a piece of tan felt on top of the layers to keep it more sturdy. I put a bowler hat and sunglasses on top and he was ready to go! He was definitely the star of our little show.

In my previous post I discussed the planning of our first family camping trip. I tried to plan everything to perfection so the kids would have the best time ever and be excited about any and all future trips and I'm proud to say that, even with a few mishaps, it was a successful trip! So, here's the recap!

The drive there was super pretty and uneventful. We followed along the side of the Arkansas River for the majority of the drive which made for some nice scenery. When we arrived the weather was nice and we got right to work setting up camp. The first snaffoo was realizing that the air pump for our air mattress needed D batteries that I did not have. So, Derek went to a the nearest town (20 minutes) to purchase some along with some alcohol for us to enjoy later by the fire. He wasn't excited about it but I have scoliosis and was unwilling to compromise with no mattress. Mere moments after his departure Arthur was trying to rinse his hands in the river and FELL IN! Luckily it is the Arkansas River Headwaters so the river is not as huge as it gets further south but he was pretty upset and the water was very cold. Luckily, the tent was set up so we got him in some dry clothes and he was all better.

When Derek returned we finished setting up our bed and had a dinner of chili cheese fries, hotdogs and s'mores. Everyone had a blast. Then it was bedtime. I purchased a tent heater to ensure that we had a good night's sleep however, I did not purchase a winterized tent. FAIL. The tent has a roof that is made entirely of mesh with an optional cover for rain. So, all of the heat our bodies and the heater produced went straight out of the top of the tent. We were all freezing for the entire night. It was terrible.

So, the next morning I have the ingenious idea to duct tape emergency blankets to the entire ceiling of the tent. I was quite proud of myself. I looked like we were inside of a a UFO and was a bit noisy but I'll take a little noise over freezing to death any day. The rest of the day was nice and relaxing. I made fire cooked blueberry french toast for breakfast which was bomb. We hung out, went for a hike, read books, the kids took advantage of all of the crafting supplies that I brough and I worked on some cross-stitching. For dinner I made us chicken teriyaki vegetables with rice which was also amaze-balls and we had some more s'mores. Then the wind came. It was so very, very windy. We had to extinguish the fire for fear of catching our tent on fire and we sent the kids into the tent to watch t.v. on my phone to distract them from the fact that Derek was outside literally holding the tent down. Oh, and the emergency blanket ceiling was soooooo loud with that wind ripping through it you could barely hear inside the tent. But, it did hold up and only had to be re-taped in a few places. And, once the wind calmed down we all slept great because the emergency blankets worked! I actually got sweaty even though it was colder the second night than it was the first.

The next morning the wind was still insane so we couldn't have a fire for breakfast but we did have a camp stove so we managed to eat some eggs and sausage. After packing up we headed to the nearby town of Buena Vista which is super picturesque. We enjoyed some well-deserved doughnuts and bougie coffee and even found an adorable bookstore to peruse for a bit. Then it was back home! 

So, was it the picture perfect trip I had planned? No. But, it was very memorable and included a lot of family time. Plus, the kids had a blast despite the sleeping woes and are ready to go back. However, I don't think I will plan another fall camping trip. We'll go for a summer trip next time and hopefully avoid all of the trouble we experienced on this trip. If you're interested in any of the fun activities, planners and recipes that I used on my trip you can find them all for free in the my Mommy Camp: Camping download found on the post linked below.

Since moving to Colorado we have been loving the ability to be outdoors! No mosquitos?! Count me in! So, after acclimating our kids to hiking and general outdoorsiness, we've decided it's time to take them on a legit camping trip! But, I want it to be perfect so they love it and we can do it all the time without whining. (Hiking took a bit before they stopped whining about going.) So, I'm planning everything down to the last detail. I don't know if you've picked up on this yet but I have never been a chill person. I'm very extra in just about everything.

After spending hours researching tents, sleeping bags and everything else I could possible need, spending way too much on Amazon. Justifying the amount spent by rationalizing that if the world ends we'll be prepared and scouring the internet for suggestions that I may not have thought of (like cracking eggs before hand and storing them in a container...genius). I think we're ready to go. And, what kind of insane, OCD, extra mom would I be if I didn't make a special binder full of the plans, recipes, lists and kid activities to go along with us?! So, enjoy my Mommy Camp: Camping Guide which you can download by clicking the photo below and be sure to check back to see if all of my planning paid off or if we ended up in a hotel.

I know...being basic is not generally one's goal. However, my friends and I made it just that when we began planning a day of fall fun for ourselves. We decided to cram as many fall activities and alcohol into one day as possible and I think we succeeded. Did I mention that my friends are the bomb?!

First, we must have an agenda. I, of course, took care of that. Everyone needs to know how this day is going down right?

After it was planned we also made basic babe tshirts (we teach elementary school and everyone wanted to be able to wear them to work), booked sitters and hit the store for food and drink. Take a look at all of our fun and know that we 100% recommend all girlfriends do this. It was so fun!

Brunch, Lattés and a Pumpkin Patch

Shopping & Candle Smelling

Dinner & Drinks in a Teepee

Crafting - We did a bleach t-shirt craft for Halloween. It was easy, cheap and had the smallest margin of error for completing while drinking.

Charcuterie, Sweets and Fall Cocktails 

Finished up with PJ's and a movie. We chose "The Craft".

Again, I cannot stress how much fun this was. Also, I got a huge number of compliments on my outfit which made me think I should go for the basic girl aesthetic more often. I literally worked so hard putting the outfit together. I bought some very interesting plaid leggings from Walmart and borrowed a hat from my daughter but I guess it worked!

We've decided that next year we'll make an extra shirt and award it to the person we see out that we deem an honorary member of our basic crew if their vibe is what we were striving for. Now that I'm typing it it sounds mean-hearted but honestly, I'm too lazy to make this look work for me everyday. I spent forever putting the outfit together and, that hat may have looked good but it drove me crazy all day long. I don't know how other people do it.

This year my daughter decided a sleepover with just a few friends was her idea of a good time for her birthday so I got to work planning the best sleepover I could imagine. Note, she is very anti girlie things like pink and sparkles so that ups the difficulty level here.

I started with a vision board as always (click the image below to get the plan and shopping list). She originally mentioned sleeping on the trampoline and making it a big tent but I successfully talked her out of that so we decided to set up a huge tent thing over the basement sofa pull-out.

No party of mine would be complete without ample craft activities so we really embodied a classic sleepover and did face masks, nail painting and made our own lipgloss. We also decorated picture frames for an instant photo we took for each girl and made our own flip flop slippers that they named "trash flops". For food we started by making our own mini pizzas. Then we had a popcorn bar stocked with all the sweets for movie time. We also had fizzy juice in fancy cups. For party favors, each girl got a custom sleepover tshirt, sleepover bag and a bunch of beauty goodies like a nail kit, mirror, nail polish, the homemade lip balm, sleep mask, the diy flip flops and the picture frames with photos that we decorated.

Making lip balm is super easy. All you need is vaseline and kool aid. You mix them together an put them in cute little containers from the travel section at Walmart.

For the flip flops I purchased dollar store flip flops and pre-cut fabric from the quilting section at Walmart. Then you just knot the strips onto the flip flop. Done! We got the frames from the dollar store too and used glitter glue and a ton of decorative items to make them our own. We used my daughters polaroid instamax to take photos of the girls for each of them to put in the frames.

To set up the tent I just used white curtains I had in storage (we didn't need them in our new house when we moved) and used push pins to pin them to the ceiling over the sofa. I also added some curtain string lights that I purchased on amazon to light it.

Between all of the crafts I planned, a basement full of sweets and a trampoline in the backyard, the girls had a fabulous sleepover. Now I just need to plan one of these for myself and my girlfriends! The pictures of the tent really don't do it justice. It was magical!

Last year I made a huge career switch and began teaching elementary Spanish in January, in the middle of a pandemic, in an entirely different part of the country. It was a big deal. My classroom was super tiny and definitely not what I needed and I made sure to let my administration know that I desperately needed bigger digs. They totally came through like the boss bitches they are and gave me a full sized classroom for the new school year. But, it was in desperate need of a facelift. I immediately got to work painting every surface of the room and planning for the overall vibe. After spending countless days of my summer vacation working on it with the help of my daughter I'm happy to say that it is perfect. I love it. I'm never leaving.

I chose to go super basic with my paint colors so I have the ability to change the room look with decorations and NEVER PAINT AGAIN. Seriously, I painted all of the walls white. Then painted both built in bookcases black (originally a dirty cream) and all of the cabinets, countertops and heater black. The counters were ORANGE. And not a cute orange. A 1970's orange. I also painted the metal shelves black and the chalkboard went from blue to gray. I chose bright colors for my accents and even made an entire wall a focus wall with sombreros I found while going through stuff the old Spanish teacher left. There were like 30 sombreros. 

I had plans to paint the stools black and cover the seats with fun paper and mod podge but I ran out of time. Maybe that's a project for next summer.

Summer was busy! With the kids getting older, our social lives in a really good place and living in a new city with many fun things to do we didn't even come close to finishing all of my Mommy Camp plans this summer. Oh! And Arthur broke his arm at the playground during our first day of mommy camp! So he spent all summer with a cast! Other than the amazing mc plans we visited with tons of family, went to Pike's Peak to see the new visitor center, peeped bugs at the May Natural History Museum, examined plants at the Denver Botanic Gardens, ate turkey legs at a rennaisance fair, visited the ferris wheel in the new Scheel's, panned for gold and gems, hiked at Red Rocks again and spent plenty of time at the pool.

It started off with an owl delivering their initiations to attend the school of Witchcraft & Wizardry for Whippersnappers. You can find the letter template in the Mommy Camp document. They were given tickets for the MC Express and then "boarded/rode the train" down our diy stair slide that led to the basement where "Diagon Alley" was set-up for them to do their shopping.

The days leading up to our start of camp I made familiar animals out of socks and fabric, quills out of electrical tape and feathers, wand boxes from a printable I found (we used chopsticks as the base for our wands which we painted and electrified later), small brooms I bought from Amazon and robes from big black t-shirts. I made signs for the "shops" and they got to collect all of their supplies before heading into the "school".

For the "school" I purchased castle decorations and hung them in our table area. I also used fishing wire to hang battery operated candles from the ceiling to add to the fun and to embody a Hogwarts vibe.

The first thing they did was to get sorted into their house. I created my own houses and then we picked which house fit their personalities best. I made a note sheet with their houses on it for my husband who was upstairs (he works from home). Then, we called him on my phone and put it on speaker phone. We taped my phone into the top of a sorting hat I bought online and then announced each time we placed the hat on one of the kids heads so he knew who he was sorting. They thought it was magical and my husband did a great job with the voice!

For the rest of our first day we electrified our wands using led's, electrical tape, a ton of hot glue, paint and a small battery. They turned out so cool! (find the tutorial in MC Harry Potter)

We ended our day with some  broom flying photos! To get these we had the kids stand with their broom and jump as high as they could with it between their legs and their knees bent. I had to literally pancake myself to the ground to get the shot but they turned out great. 

After our first day we had a break for travel and other fun but met back up for more activities. We focused on wand magic by making feathers float with our wands using magnets. Then we practiced a balancing spell by making bridges out of straws to balance some gems. We also threw some broom fun in and made brooms out of pipe cleaners and pony beads. Then we did another broom focused activity and played pong quidditch. We ended our day by making pretzel wands.

We only managed one other day of Mommy Camp this summer and that was a day focused on potions! It was definitely one of my favorite MC days ever and everyone had a blast. To start, we created portable potion kitchen kits for them to store their concoctions from the day and make more in the future. I spent weeks collecting various bottles and filled them with all of our ingredients and added labels that matched a recipe book for potions that I made (find it at the original post). Then we made each potion together. Some had a color reaction, some fizzed, others changed consistency but they are all awesome.  After we finished each potion they put a sample of it inside of a tiny potion bottle I purchased from Hobby Lobby/Dollar Tree. Honestly, the ability to store their tiny potions in the portable kit was the highlight. Mine carried theirs around for weeks after and showed everyone they could. We ended the day by making bath bombs. They were supposed to be golden snitch's but that didn't really work out. They did smell good and still worked as a bath bomb they just didn't look like snitches.

While we didn't even get halfway through all of my plans we most definitely had a good time so I'll call it a win. As a bonus, we can pick up where we left off next summer and I can save myself hours upon hours of planning a new MC! If you are interested in doing any of the activities mentioned be sure to visit the original post containing the FREE Harry Potter Themed Mommy Camp that includes detailed directions, supply lists and daily plans!

This year the theme for Mommy Camp is Harry Potter! I am so excited to get this adventure started! You can follow along and do all of the fun things that we do by printing out the plan below complete with links to all of the printables and diy directions for FREE! So, be sure to stop back by and see all of our fun! 

Six years ago I built a PVC playhouse. It was super cute, easy to take apart and I spent a lot of time creating it so, when we moved from our first home to our second and there wasn't a place to put it, I kept it in the attic. I'm not throwing away all that work! So, it sat in the attic for four years until our recent move across the country. When we found it hidden in the far corner of the attic my reaction was the same. We are not throwing that away! So it made the trip with us. Our new home has a HUGE basement which has a dedicated play area for the kids and is a perfect place to bring the playhouse back to life. I was able to rebuild it by referring to my old blog post without any issues and the kids were pumped. But, the cover had seen better days so I spent a few days making a new, more aesthetically pleasing one. I bought a king sized white sheet and scrounged around my fabric scraps where I found a black and white polka dot material for curtains I used black felt for the flower boxes and instead of making felt flowers like before I thought an added element of being able to switch the flowers for the seasons would be fun so I bought cheap fake flowers and trimmed the stems so they would fit. To finish it off I used another king sized sheet but in black for the roof and painted white shingles on it. I also put some Christmas lights in the top of the house. 

I was not about to sew anything this time and just hot glued the cover to the frame this time. I figure I can always pull it off pretty easily when it's time to retire the playhouse again. But, rest assured, I plan on keeping it until I have grandkids who will find it just as magical as my kids do right now and I will be MiMi of the year!

It's been one year since the world was turned upside down. During that year everyone has suffered in one form or another and most people have experienced serious life-changes. As you read in my previous post, we had a major life change and moved across the country during this pandemic which was definitely an interesting and stressful experience. 

So, we decided to recognize the anniversary of the start of the pandemic by doing some activities.

We did a few crafts, created a family time capsule, played some games and took our frustrations on a DIY covid piñata. ​It was a nice way to reflect on this insane year and to have a little bit of fun while still respecting the importance of the day and how it has affected people. We stayed in our pajamas all day and ended our activities by going to the movies covid style and bought the new Disney movie "Raya and the Last Dragon" to watch at home with popcorn and candy.

I also created a collage of photos from our year in quarantine to memorialize it and plan on hanging it somewhere in the house. Even though it was scary and difficult, we had many wonderful times all together.

We made soap jellies kind of like the lush jellies you can buy. They were super easy and the kids thought the result was amazing. We even put little trinkets inside to find. You can find the recipe I used here.

We wrote letters to our future selves and colored "stay at home" coloring pages to put in our time capsule. We also included a trinket that reminded us of this time to look back on later. The plan is not to open the box until at least 10 years from now and I shoved it in the far reaches of our basement storage room. So no one is tempted to peek sooner.

We talked about germs and did several germ activities including making germ cookies, germ removal playdough, designing our own germ and a "find the germs" water activity using velcro balls, soap and a sponge. We also did the glitter + milk + soap experiment.

We played a few minute to win it style games revolving around toilet paper including a toilet paper toss and balancing tp races. Then they attacked the piñata I made. To make it I found a baseball pi​ñata and just hot glued red paper cups around the edges. It looked pretty good!