Fast Friday {in review}

Today was another Fast Friday...which means I've got a great fast fix to share with you lucky people.  Aren't you excited? I am!

I probably should've taken the day to clean my very messy house (my sisters and their kiddos came to play yesterday.  It was an awesome day...but my house took the brunt of the tornado of fun) but I decided it would be way more fun to give our front porch a makeover.  You can see why it needed one:

I hear the Debbie Downer sound when I look at this: "wah wah"

So...off me and the kids went to get the supplies we needed.  Luckily, we live close enough to the crafts store that we can just take a quick walk (stroller ride) to the store, so we got to take advantage of the beautiful weather. (score!)  We got a can of white spray paint and a can of red.  (I find Rustoleum brand works best for me.)  I also decided that you couldn't have a spring makeover without some flowers, so I sprung for those as well.  Total I think this makeover cost about $16 - not too shabby.  When we got back all three of us got busy....I got busy painting while the kids got busy being artists on the sidewalk.

It took less than an hour to get the table and chair painted and flowers potted.  Here is the finished product...

I was very happy with the results and love the pop of color the table now brings to the front porch.  Now if I can only find a teal/blueish pot for this flower the next time I go thrifting it would be ah-mazing!

I'd love to hear your creative ideas or see your fast fix products linked in the comments section.  

Fast Friday

In honor of how I live a lot of my life these days (after baby...and then baby number two), I thought I'd do a post about one of my quick fixes.  The story goes like this:

The day before the Easter party at Ella and Noah's MMO (Mother's Morning Out) class had arrived.  What's sad about this story, is that I had actually planned ahead and gone to Sam's Club to order some super cute cupcakes to take.  (I briefly...as in maybe 5 seconds...contemplated making them but then I realized although I've baked lots of things, I've never made cupcakes and don't even have a cupcake pan - I think I just forfeited my mother of the year nomination)  When we had gone to Sam's Club the day before they had a MOUNTAIN of cupcakes on display.  Naturally, I thought..."I don't need to order any when they have this abundance of super cute Easter cupcakes available, I'll just swing back by tomorrow to get some fresh ones."

                  ((Fast forward to the next day - the day before the party))

OF COURSE when we went back to Sam's there had been a run on cupcakes (I pictured something similar to the scene in Wal-Mart during Black Friday, except replace the huge tv's with cupcakes)  There were absolutely NO cute Easter cupcakes like there had been the day before.  In fact, we were lucky to get one of the last boxes of generic party cupcakes.  We had to do some quick thinking to make transform these into Easter cupcakes.  They wouldn't win an award or even make it to the Pinterest prestige level...but they worked, and I think they went over well with the preschoolers.

The BEFORE picture - these don't exactly say "Easter", right?

The AFTER picture - add a green icing nest, some Eastery sprinkles,
A peep (we used a toothpick to stick them on), and a few jelly beans,
 ...and voila - Easterish cupcakes.  

What is your latest and greatest quick fix?  I'd love to add some great ideas to my arsenal of quick fix tools!  Happy Friday!!