I love my family for putting up with my CRAZY.

For the Fourth of July, I had visions of an elaborate picnic at a park with a beach -- I'd have all the time I needed to get the picnic set up while the hubs and the kids played at the beach and they'd be in awe of the spread when they came back ready to eat.  After lunch we'd frolic and play and leave at the end of the day with that 'good tired' feeling after a long day of fun.

I carefully planned and gathered my materials in the days leading up to the fourth.

And then because of circumstances beyond anyones control, our plans changed.  We would still be picnicing at a park-- just not one with a beach (no biggie) and we would be under much more of a time crunch  (hmmm...)  Well-- I already had all of my "supplies" packed up and ready to go so... I did it anyway.

Things went off pretty well (although at a more stressful pace than I would've liked) and without a hitch.  Well almost....

at least the skinned knee was at the end of our day just as we were packing up

Here's what I came up with minus a few details that didn't quite make it up in time as people were hungry and wanted to actually start eating-- the nerve! :)

Fourth of July-- crazy momma style!

We just had your (easy to transport) picnic basics-- hot dogs, turkey burgers, chips, lettuce salad, pasta salad ...

Recognize some of my great finds from my last bargain hunting adventure?

and desserts.  

 Yes- I brought books as a styling prop and No- my husband was not psyched to find out that we had lugged books as styling props with us.   But they sure do look good right?  :)

And remember these?

My original plan was to hang them from the trees so they could blow in the breeze, but there the trees weren't in the right spot (again-- what's wrong with mother nature not having trees where I want them) so I strung them up like a banner instead.

How cute are these pinwheel cupcake toppers?  I used this tutorial except I used thumb tacks instead of straight pins because that's what I had on hand.  Use what ya' got!  Took about 20 minutes-- so cute!  (and don't worry-- I glued the thumbtacks in so that no children could stab themselves on sharp objects)

TIP:  Another little trick (seen above).  I just cover my "lacy" cake stand with different coordinating ribbon for each party- like I did here.

All in all, I'm pretty happy with how it turned out in the end.

And after all was said and done, we were only able to get one picnic table so I had to deconstruct the whole thing so that we actually had a place to eat.  :)

Hope you all had a great holiday weekend!