A Party and Some Printed Pillows

Every year I host a get-together for all of the women I taught with at my previous school.  I left that school 3 years ago and I find that this is the best way to keep all of these dear friends in  my life and up to date with the "goings-on" in each others' lives.  

I try to keep the party as simple as possible - food, drink and lots of things to keep the kids happy and busy!

I planned everything for outside, but the day of the party was so blinking HOT, that we moved it all inside!! The kids were in and out - after all you can only blow bubbles and play with water guns OUTSIDE - but all of the food, wine and chatter took place where the air-conditioner was cranked up!

As usual these days, a few of my party ideas came straight from Pinterest.

While we waited for the 10 mommies and their kids to arrive, I snapped a few pics to capture these summery moments:

Juice boxes on ice, Timbit and strawberry kababs, paper lantern decor and a bucket full of new sand and water toys

A yummy display of veggies, plastic "glassware" ready to be filled with a cocktail, bubble equipment and flowers in full bloom

Now the title of this post contained "Printed Pillows."  How do those fit into the party scheme?  Well - to be honest, these pillows came into fruition a day or two before the party while I visualized the decor for the get-together.  My deck is covered in pots of pink flowers and all of the furniture is quite neutral in colour.  I have a few throw pillows that I purchased last year, but unfortunately they became quite faded over the summer months.  When I pulled them out for THIS summer, I knew I needed to add a few more pillows with a bit more colour-zip.  

I used a chunk of fuchsia cotton that I found at the thrift store and took it from plain to pizzazz  using craft paint, a sponge brush and some foam stamps.

With stamp and paint in hand I went to town  creating a garden of daisies on my pink fabric.  

Love the daisies, but I needed more colour zing.  Add in the yellow centres:

Once satisfied with one kind of print, I covered another section of the fabric with a different pattern using several shapes of stamps.  A little touch of yellow landed here, too!

It took next to no time to whip these rectangle chunks of fabric into 3 throw pillows:

And they were the perfect addition to the "deck decor" for my party.  In fact, every time I am out on our deck, I am so pleased with how they turned out. They are the perfect dash of colour for the beginning of the summer!