I am not a very traditional bride. I already have children and I’ve been married before, so I want to choose some options that are less “walking down the aisle” and more “yay! we finally made it official.”

With that in mind I want you to help me decide on one of these four options:

What do you think?
Giant Flower, Giant Pinwheel, Paper Bouquet, or Real Bouquet?

And soeaking of turtles, this Bayou Bash from Spaceships and Laserbeams is perfectly swampy!

This adorable little man mustache baby shower by Frog Prince Paperie is perfectly groomed!

Students from around the world are preparing to graduate in the coming weeks, and Mirabelle Creations is sharing a round-up of 6 graduation party ideas.

 
It’s all about how to celebrate this Memorial Day  at Magnolia Creative.

Hello fabulous Hello My Sweet readers! We have got something super duper special for you today and we hope you squee with glee when we tell you, that we are giving away an AMAZING prize package to one lucky reader! We love you guys and we appreciate all of your continued support and visits year after year. This is our third year as a business and blog and we couldn’t be happier with what we are doing. We want you to be happy too, so read on to find out what you could win!

You have the opportunity to win a $1000 Photographer's Dream Shopping Spree. You can pick out anything you like from DSLR cameras to camera bags to accessories and lighting and more. Or you can opt for $1000 USD transferred to you via PayPal so that you can shop to your heart's content.

There are quiet a few amazing bloggers and vendors who came together to make this amazing giveaway possible including Spaceships and Laser Beams, Yumtastics, Go Against the Grain, Life Revolves Around Them, Mimi's Dollhouse, Not Just A Mommy, Angelina´s Dream Parties, Twinkled Spice Boutique, Hello My Sweet, Party Snobs, Inkberry Cards + Design, UR invited, Petite Bebe, Party Printables, Unlimited Party Themes, Party On! Designs, Vanessa Hankins Photography, My Garden Party, Dorothy Kurzydlowski Photography, Sugar Sugar Cakes, DimplePrints, Creative Juice Cafe, Miss Party Mom, PaperCandee, Creative Designs by Toni, Paige Simple Studio, Calamity Kate's Kitchen, Simply Creative Printables,The Way The Cookie Crumbles, Michelle's Party Plan-It, Paper and Style Co., And Everything Nice, Samantha Walker Designs, Simply Sweet Parties, Events by Kate, Cupcake Wishes & Birthday Dreams, One Inspired Party, Kima's Konfections,This Nest is Best, Triple M Good Parties and Myour Stories Designs. And that's not even everyone!!!

More than 60 people are contributing to this contest. To see the complete list, take a look at the Rafflecopter form. As small businesses and blogs, we would never be able to offer such a cool prize, so it's a lot of fun to be able to combine forces and giveaway something so special.

Prize Details: The winner can select up to $1000 in camera equipment or supplies (including all sales taxes and shipping) to be delivered to the single destination of their choosing. The winner has the option of receiving $1000 USD in PayPal funds in lieu of receiving their prize.

The winner will be selected randomly via Rafflecopter. The odds of winning are dependent on the number of people entering. Should the winning entrant(s) not respond within 48 hours of being emailed, another winner(s) will be selected. Please ensure spaceshipsandlaserbeams [at] gmail [dot] com is on your safe email list. We would hate to have to redraw another winner!

Rules: This contest is open worldwide from May 17, 2013 at 12:01am EST to June 6, 2013 at 11:59pm EST. All entrants must be the age of the majority in their own country. Should unforeseen circumstances occur, this contest could be cancelled at any time. Void where prohibited by law.

Enter Using Our Rafflecopter Form
Good Luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Disclosure: This blog did not receive any money to participate or promote this contest. This giveaway is in not way associated with Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, PayPal or any camera-related company. As one of many participants, we are not responsible for logistics or prize delivery. If you have any questions, please contact Stephanie at Spaceships and Laser Beams by emailing spaceshipsandlaserbeams [at] gmail [dot] com.

Follow this one simple trick for easy sugar cookies to keep your kitchen neat and tidy while baking homemade cookies!

As anyone who bakes will tell you, it’s a messy business. Flour and confectioner’s sugar are especially terrible culprits of a baking mess. The rewards to baking far outweigh the pitfalls however, so we continue in spite of the mess. I always appreciate it whenever I happen upon a tip like the easy sugar cookies prep to add to my kitchen routine. I discovered one recently that gave me a “Why didn’t I think of that?” moment (you know those right?) and I will hang on to it from here on out. What is it? Parchment paper. Before you decide to give up on this post because you already know about parchment paper, give me a few more lines. This is not your average everyday, use it to line your baking pans mess-free baking tip. No, this is much more clever.

Click here to jump to our full article on The Flair Exchange blog.

So this is a week late due in part to my inability to find time to edit photos, but we wanted to acknowledge our son’s 4th birthday, on May 6th. Here he is blowing out his candles like a pro. More to come later in the month with full party details on his Nerf Elite birthday party. We had a blast!

We would love to include you all in the decision making details of our small ceremony and so from time to time we plan to ask your opinion (who doesn’t love to give that out?).

Here’s the first one:

Which look do you like best for our correspondence?

These are our four favorite looks from our favorite place to shop, Etsy.

Help us out and leave a comment with your favorite choices and tell us why you like it, we will pick one and announce it at the end of the week!

To say we were excited was an understatement, we love to work with something nostalgic from our childhood. The Legend of Zelda is of course still alive and kicking today, but this lady played it on the original NES system way back in 1989. It was my favorite game right alongside with Super Mario Bros. I was a little rusty on all things Link and Hyrule but a quick trip to the Zelda Wiki and we were full of fresh ideas! We were so honored to be a part of this awesome Zelda Birthday, thank you so much for thinking of us Mayra!

Zelda Birthday Party Details as told by Mayra of In Flight:

This Legend of Zelda inspired Party was created from my son’s favorite video games and things we have in common. We have both enjoyed playing Zelda together since he was about 4 years old and use to ask me to play with him, only to sit there and enjoy seeing me play the video game for him.

Our appreciation for our favorite past time and the game brought us to bring different things into the party from several of the Zelda games. The names of the food, the props, the background, and even the colors on the cake!

We were so excited that Hello My Sweet created the perfect collection to go with our party and that so many elements of the games were presented into the design. The maps, swords, hourglass, and the poster like look of the design is also so representative of the most modern versions of Zelda games available today. We were truly happy with everything starting with the invitation to the cork on the water bottles!

I created Zelda games bombs with honeycomb balls and used cardboard and crepe paper to do the tops. The background represents the woods with greenery and wood planks. The cutest sign as those found through the game.

For the food we had Hero’s Cake, cakepops, chocolate covered oreos, cookies that represented Stained glass art found in the dungeons on the game, gelatin ‘chuchus’ which are a sort of jelly monsters, cookie hearts for lives, watermelon juice for potion drink to fill up on energy, forest water, a trail mix cupcake for fire arrows, cuccos chickens cupcakes which are chickens found through the games, and rock candy to serve as rupees…the jewels that Link finds through the game.

Zelda Wallet bags were given as favors with jewel crayons inside for the kids to take home and enjoy. We had a wonderful time, plenty of fun and an incredible adventure enjoying all the goodies!

Credits:

Party Styling - In Flight

Zelda Printable Collection - Hello My Sweet

Photography - Inspired by Jayne

Wooden Cake Stands - Sweet Display

Link Wooden Peg - Craft That Party

Glitter Candles and Zelda Wallet Bags - Vanessa Grant Events

Chicken Fondant Toppers - Love & Sugar Kisses

Chocolate Covered Oreos - Sweet Temptations

Stained Glass Art Cookies - Sugarlily Cookie Co.

Heart Cookies - KJ Cookies

Fire Arrow Toppers - Go Against The Grain

Wooden Arrow Forks - Sucre Shop

Glitter Numbers - Letters from AtoZ

Potion Jars - The Papered Nest

Door Wreath - In Flight

Cakepops, Cupcakes and Cake - In Flight

This Cherry Blossoms and Confetti Balloons Spring Party Idea sprouted (haha! get it? things sprout in the spring…) from a beautiful handmade paper we found at World Market.

This was my maiden voyage to the wonders of World Market and I was so inspired by all of the different patterns, colors, textures available. Unfortunately we live in small town USA and the nearest store is an hour and twenty minutes away. We don’t go often. It is for this reason I promptly purchased the beautiful handmade paper with lovely gold and pink cherry blossoms all over it, and took it home for safe keeping until we were ready to display it. Many months past, and we gathered an item or two here and there on various outings, until one day, spring had finally arrived and we were ready to put together our party idea, complete with cherry blossoms and confetti balloons!

To see more of this beautiful party, visit the full post HERE on The Flair Exchange blog.

Cupcake Wishes and Birthday Dreams is sharing her favorite places to find Earth Day Party Supplies.

Everything Mommyhood shares some of these helpful Spring Cleaning Tips to check some things off your list.

 


Party Printables tells us about how to give away favors that last for your next party or celebration!

Spaceships and Laserbeams show off their super cute Woodland Party.

BellaGrey Designs has awesome Cinco de Mayo finds from Etsy!

Creative Juice is making raspberry and lemon meringues in the shape of rosettes, perfect for Mother’s Day!

Three Little Monkey’s Studio shows us how to bake the world’s best banana bread recipe!

Frog Prince Paperie shows of their motorcycle birthday party, super cool for little dudes.

Mirabelle Creations shows us her modern baseball party complete with a home plate backdrop!

Magnolia Creative is making a Tulip Teacher Thank You treat to share.

D&P Celebrations is making a  Peanut Butter Frosting recipe that we are drooling over!

This Earth Day cupcake idea from Sweet Song Bird look fun and tastey.