All by Brittany Payne
It has been over a month since our return from Disney, but I am finally getting to posting all about our fun trip! Brad does not entirely agree, but I must say that this was one of my least tiring trips to Disney World in quite some time. I did get to sleep in one day while he got up early to take Melody to Magic Kingdom (more on that soon), but the trip overall went so smooth.
As my previous post explains, we have been pretty busy between Spring Break, Easter, starting a new company, and life in general. March was a really fun month though! Check out all the fun below.
Guys, I did it! I finally started an Etsy shop. It has kind of been a long time coming really. I make so many shirts, invites, and so much more that I knew at some point I wanted to bring all of that to other people. I bought my domain, Pink Glitter Designs, over a year ago. I was hoping to host it via Squarespace and not really deal with the Etsy fees and such. However, I did a lot of research on the pros and cons, and it just made sense to start up with Etsy and see how things go.
Back in February, Melody had her dance pictures made. This will be her last year in a combo type class. Next year she will have to start narrowing down what specific dance classes she wants to take (jazz, tap, ballet, etc.). Her teacher picked a fun and completely different costume this year compared to years before. And we did a high pony this year too. I really loved how this turned out!
We have wanted a nice coffee bar for some time. And once we bought our current house, we had the perfect spot. However, we just couldn’t find the perfect one for the right price. One trip at Hobby Lobby, I saw one I loved. Brad and I measured it, and it would fit perfectly in our kitchen space, After drop off one day, Brad and I headed to Hobby Lobby and bought it!
A few months ago, my daughter’s teacher asked if myself and another mom could help with a craft in her class one Friday morning. They were learning about various tiny people. She found some wooden pegs from Amazon, and she wanted the students to create their own tiny person along with an item from their story. I decided to google each character and make a “sample” to give the kids a starting point if they needed it. Quite a few had their own ideas and totally made them unique to their personality.
A few months ago, my friend and I were talking about different products we use on our face. It likely stemmed from a conversation about our dermatologists. Well it dawned on me that I use quite a few products in my morning and night routine. So I thought I would share those with you. In no way are these products an ad, and they honestly may not even be the best products I could be using. But they don’t break out my face, and they seem to be working, ha.
Well let’s just continue the app reviews with another one this week. My April cruise was the first cruise I had been on in over 6 years! So some things were bound to be a different. A big difference came with the Carnival App. Carnival no longer provided paper copies of “The Fun Times”. Instead, everything you needed to know about you could find in their app. You cannot really explore their app from home, so I was sure to take A LOT of screenshots to share!
When visiting Dollywood, we were sure to download the Dollywood App to help us navigate the park. While the park isn’t in need of navigation quite like at Disney World, there are some tricky areas. The app can also be useful in finding out wait times, height restrictions, and just general information. It is a great tool to help make your day a little bit easier. We also stored our season tickets in the app. By doing so, we did not have to go get a physical pass card made. Although this can be troublesome if you ever find yourself without internet. But you can also add it to your wallet in your phone to make it easier too. Another negative here is that with Bring-A-Friend tickets, they do not go away once used. So that can be a bit frustrating.
Valentine’s Day may already be over, but I wanted to still go ahead and share what I made for Melody’s Valentine’s Day exchange this year. You can pin it or save it so you can remember for next year if you want as well. It was super easy to make too. Melody did most of the work after I my Silhouette printed and cut them out!
For my best friend’s baby shower, I wanted to come up with a usable and practical guestbook. I had seen it before, and I thought building blocks would be cute. I bought a pack from Hobby Lobby. I made sure they had some blank sides. Then I came up with a cute sign to sit beside it. I had a jar I wrapped some pumpkin ribbon around, and then people could write on them and place them in the jar when finished. I think it was such a cute idea that she could easily display in the baby’s room!
February was a really fun month. We have been prepping a lot for our upcoming Disney trip and that means lots of countdowns! We also have just been busy in general. Check it out below!
At my mom’s previous job, she would travel a lot for work. She would go to Pigeon Forge often, and one of her favorite places is The Chop House. So on our trip back last summer, we ate dinner there one evening.
Mornings (and evenings) can be quite the battle with Melody. So last year I created some daily routine charts to try and help keep Melody on track. It worked most of the time. To be honest, we don’t use it much anymore. But we did find it helpful at the time. At the bottom you can find printable ones as well.
A big problem area in our playroom is the amount of toys Melody has and her inability to really find all the things. One of those things would be all of her American Girl doll clothes. She has a bitty baby, all of the WellieWishers, and a TrulyMe doll. With all those dolls comes a lot of clothes. And she rarely change their clothes because she has trouble finding all their outfits. And when she did find the outfit she was looking for, all the others were left in the floor. So I started researching ways to better store the clothes. Here is what I came up with!
For Melody’s 6th birthday party, I made a LOT of lists to help me keep up with all the things. Lists sometimes are my best friend, and when it comes to planning an event, they are super helpful. My lists vary from what is needed on each table, general decor, what is needed for each item (think invites, favors, etc.), and to do lists. My to do lists are done in two steps. One - I make a general list. Two - I take said list and organize it by ideal date that it needs to be completed. This then gives me a good idea on how I am going to complete all the things.
We always keep Valentine’s Day low-key. That has been what we have done even when Brad and I were just dating. This year was no different!
My best friend’s baby shower was a pumpkin theme since it happened in October. Her favorite cake is red velvet, so I decided to do that since it kind of had the fall look with the colors. I ordered from our favorite bakery, Edgar’s. I wanted a cute cake topper, so I decided to just make one myself. I found a cute font, and incorporated a pumpkin with it. I had orange and gold glitter cardstock that I used to make it with. Then I attached the topper to toothpicks. It wasn’t the most stable topper, but it held up the entire party, and I think it turned out cute!
The theme for my cousin’s bridal shower was “miss to mrs.” Her maid of honor has her own floral shop, and she did the flowers for Ashley’s wedding as well as the ones for her shower. One thing Ashley wanted was a bouquet bar. So her maid of honor made that happen!
Back in May and June of 2022, we went to Pigeon Forge to visit Dollywood. During our trip, we found a cute ice cream/coffee shop on our daily drive to Dollywood from our cabin in Sevierville. The ice cream portion is called Sweet Frogs. It is a traditional FroYo place. But connected to it was a coffee named Smoky Mountain Espresso. It is located on Veterans Boulevard connecting Sevierville to Pigeon Forge. They did have a drive thru, but we went in each time. We literally visited daily. I loved that they had a dole whip flavor!
