camping birthday party: behind the scenes

I was happy to have an excuse to try some new craft projects and do some screen printing. I was out of photo emulsion and didn't want to buy more (screen printing can be an expensive hobby!) so I decided to DIY it and made my own screen with an embroidery hoop and sheer curtain material. I drew the bear on the screen and then painted Mod Podge everywhere that I didn't want to print. The Mod Podge blocks the ink from getting through the material. And that's it! Once the screen is made, printing is the fun part. Anybody want a bear printed on something? I still have the screen...

I found a guy on Craigslist who had cut down some trees and was giving the wood away for free. Ben stopped by and picked up some nice stumps to use for our fire pit seating and a few extra to carve up for decoration and my cake stands. If your party prep involves a chain saw, you're off to a good start.

Cutting fabric with my Silhouette. Still amazed by this crazy machine.

The fire pit turned out to be a super easy project. I think Ben built it in about 30 minutes. Most of the effort was in hauling the bricks from the car to the backyard.

Frosting and assembling the cakes took much longer than I thought. I really don't know much about building/decorating cakes. I snapped a few photos while I was doing it in case something went terribly wrong later (like dropping them while carrying them outside).