Summertime is almost here and you know what that means….backyard barbecues, swimming, camping, campfires, and of course s’mores! It’s just not summer without that delightful combination of crunchy grahams, gooey toasted mallows, and sweet melted chocolate. We had our first party of the season last week to celebrate my son’s 19th birthday, and for the main feature, I put together a simple but super fun s’mores station for everyone to indulge in throughout the night.
You can find a variety of sizes of glass storage jars and metal skewers on Amazon. I printed out letters for a “S’MORES” sign and some labels for the jars and then backed them with brown and black card stock. My son is gluten and dairy free, so I made sure to include gluten free graham crackers and dairy free chocolate options as well. #CommissionsEarned
I can imagine that I will reuse these stylish jars for many other social gatherings in the future, so I feel like they were great investments…and I know that this was just the first of many summertime s’mores nights at our house. #CommissionsEarned
My daughter has been asking to have a lemonade stand since last summer, so it was a must on our 2018 Summer Bucket List. I saw some cute DIY ideas using wooden crates and thought that we would give it a go. I found the best deal for wooden crates at our local Michael’s Store. My husband had a 36″ x 10″ board cut at The Home Depot. I purchased two different sizes of nails, 1-1/4 inches for the thicker parts and 3/4 inches for the thinner wood slats, and went to work. You can watch my video tutorial for more details on the building process. #CommissionsEarned
Hobby Lobby recently had a huge clearance on their summer stock, so I was able to get two giant yellow pinwheels for just $4 each. They made the cutest sides to hang a LEMONADE banner on. I used my Cricut Expression 2 to cut out the letters for the banner and hung it with twine. A few material scraps cut into triangles made for a mini pennant banner to hang along one of the crates. I created an “Ice Cold Lemonade” sign, a price list for some treats that we made, and lemon cupcake toppers that you can print off here Lemonade Stand Printables PDF
My daughter loves to dance, and every summer her dance studio holds a week long dance camp. We decided that selling lemonade & treats would be a great way for her to earn the $125 tuition for camp. On a Friday evening, we made a batch of cupcakes and marshmallow pops. I have included the lemon template I used for the candy melt lemons. Lemon Template pdf (See some of my marshmallow pop videos for instructions on how to create themed mallow pops)
On Saturday and Sunday, my girl held lemonade stands in our driveway, and not only did she have the best time selling lemonade and sweet treats, she earned $129 in two mornings thanks to the generosity and support of our amazing friends and neighbors. I will never forget the joy on her face when she walked into the dance studio on that Monday morning and paid her entire tuition in full with money she had earned herself. Lemonade stand success!!!
I am so pleased with the way our DIY Lemonade Stand turned out, and have been thinking of other uses for it. Of course she can always use it for imaginary play, but I’m sure we will also use it for birthday parties in the future, bake sales, donuts and juice during our garage sale, and of course, many many more lemonade stands.
kerricreates 