Before Summer ends, make the best of the last dog days by treating your kids to a Backyard Camping and Glamping night! Today, I’m sharing a few super simple and easy (I promise) ideas to on creating your own backyard camp. All summer my kids have been begging us to go camping and while it would be a great experience, we just don’t have the time to do it this year, and by time, I mean….I don’t do camping. Since I don’t want to be the one to ruin summer, I decided, why not bring the camp to us!
I know my husband just loves when I come up with these wacky ideas…..that he has to participate in…and by participate….I mean, he has to build stuff. Let’s start with the tents, shall we? No proper campsite is worth it’s weight in bug spray unless it has a tent, right? Well, since we aren’t really ‘campers’ in this house, we had to use my creative prowess to come up with something super cute and fancy for my bay-bees. Like any good creative genius, I trolled Pinterest for ideas to make a tent and found one that was super easy to do…..and by super easy….I mean, my husband wouldn’t fuss at me because he’d be the one building it :)
To create the frames for the tents, I used 5 ft long wooden yard stakes. My husband drilled holes into four of the sticks and then screwed them together with a piece of wood across the top. I was thinking that there’d be plans to follow and measurements, but NOPE! He’s a genius. A purebred genius.
To cover the tent, I used duvet covers that I purchased at the thrift store. I like the thrift store, it calls to me, it sings to me…..I NEVER know exactly what I will find, but somehow, I always wind up coming out of it with just want I was looking for. So, it was no surprise when I walked up in that bad boy and sniffed out the cutest Ikea duvet covers….that were also the perfect length for my tent frames…..and it was such a score to get them on the cheap! The patterns were perfect for my son and daughter!
Call me lazy, call me a hack, but I totally didn’t do anything fancy to keep those covers in tact. I basically held them (temporarily) in place with thumb tacks. Don’t judge. Seriously though, I plan to either stitch Velcro or ribbon ties in the future for something more permanent because we do plan to bring the tents indoors for the kids to play in whenever they want. It’ll be great for the winter and maybe will give them to stay in their room at night…..(blank stare).
Once the tents were set up, I decorated each one with on of my pompom garlands. I also made each of my darlings a cute sign for their tents. For my son’s tent, I placed a CAMP sign that I created with faux wood letters and a cut piece of tree trunk. Then, my daughter got a chalkboard sign that said GLAMPING and I embellished the sign with fun girly-girl buttons. For each tent, I added torch lights, lanterns, and other decorative pieces that matched my kids’ cute….suuuper cute personalities. Then, inside of the tents, I simply pulled out old sheets that we had in our linen closet and beach mats to tie everything together. Super simple and easy right?!!
Everybody knows, that no camp out is complete with out Smores and Bug Juice! I set out a basket chock full of the kids’ favorite candy chocolates, Oreo cookies, graham crackers and marshmallows for the kids to build their own smores. I put everything in glass mason jars along with some wooden sticks, then put all that in a basket. Then, we set up a small ‘fire pit’ for them to roast their marshmallows and enjoy their treats.
A long time ago, I was preggo and addicted to pickles……true story……and I kept this humongous glass pickle jar because I figured….I’d need it one day….I’ll use it. So, what do you know? I did use it….. to make a cool and refreshing drink for the kids! I am not one to shy away from Kool-Aid….it’s so wrong….yet so right and kids seem to love it so, I used it to make bug juice and they totally dug it….they REALLY thought it was made with bugs! Bless it!
It doesn’t really take much to put together a backyard camp for your little ones. Use your creativity, find stuff around the house, throw it out there and make it fun……and if all else fails….bring candy and bug juice!
This post originally featured on Design Dazzle's Summer Camp Series
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