Tiny Oranges – Fresh, fun blog for OC moms

I used this darling company for my daughter’s first birthday party invitation after falling in love with their products at an event a couple years ago. A completely unique stationery design company, PosePrints allows you to create your own custom stationery with look-alike caricatures in less than five minutes!  They recently launched a new line of custom business cards and super cute mommy calling cards and I have two sets to give away, make sure to enter below.

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For those of you who have been reading my blog, you know how much I love holiday photo cards. It’s a tiny obsession.

I get a rush when I get the mail in December. I quickly throw aside anything that is not a holiday card, then I sit with my stack of photo cards and open and appreciate each one and then carefully display them so I can see them all throughout the entire month.

I vividly remember a very unique, lovely design last from one of our friends so I quickly turned it over to see which company made such such a super cute card and found Minted.  Seriously, oh my holiday cuteness! I could hardly stand it!

AND Minted has offered me a $100 gift card to give away to one of my readers for your holiday photo cards or Christmas photo cards this year!! Read below and enter!

A few things I personally love about the designs.  They are really unique and different from things you have seen before.  That is because they do design challenges, where graphic designers from around the world submit entries and the Minted fans decide which designs to sell.  How cool is that?

They also have FUN features I have to point out.  You can opt on some designs to include a photo on the back along with a printed, personalized holiday greeting which can include a paragraph or two on some highlights from your year! So cute!

They also have something fun called the “Yearline” on some designs where you can include different photos on the back highlighting some family milestones.

And being a stationery buff, I love that the fact their Signature paper is printed on 130-lb textured matte paper and they also offer a thick 100% Recycled paper option.

One click and you will be in love!

Now that you have fallen, they currently have a Minted Coupon Discount Code of AFHOL20 for 20% off your holiday card order, but I would hurry and order as I don’t know how long it will last!

Hooray!  It’s a Tiny Giveaway!

Minted is giving away one $100 Minted credit valid on any Minted holiday card order! Woo hoo!  Contest runs through Wednesday, November 24th, 2010 at 5pm PST.  Make sure to leave your email address in your comment so I can email you if you are the lucky winner!  Please leave a separate comment for each entry option:

1. Click HERE and tell me which design is your favorite – 1 ENTRY
2. {Like} Minted on Facebook - 1 ENTRY
3. Follow @Minted on Twitter - 1 ENTRY
4. {Like} Tiny Oranges on Facebook – 1 ENTRY
5. Follow @TinyOrangesOC on Twitter – 1 ENTRY
6. Subscribe to Tiny Oranges email updates – 1 ENTRY

GOOD LUCK!

{Disclosure:  Tiny Oranges is a part of the Minted Affiliate program.  If you do order from Minted, I would so appreciate if you started your shopping by clicking through here!}

For those that have been reading my blog for awhile, you probably already know I am a stationery fanatic.  I get giddy when I receive cute invitations in the mail, and don’t even get me started on photo cards at the holidays…MY FAVORITE part of the season!   That’s why I am excited to share a giveaway from one of my amazing sponsors, Lil Bean Sprout!  Make sure to read the last paragraph on how you can enter to win 24 CUSTOM printed pieces! Yippee!

Lil Bean Sprout is also offering Tiny Oranges readers a special Lil Bean Sprout coupon code for 20% off all orders over $15.00 today through July 18^th, 2010, so if you have a special event coming up, take advantage and use discount code “TINYFANS” at check out!

Lil Bean Sprout offers something for every occasion…either in her pre-designed cards or she can create a custom design just for you.  Announcements, party invitations, thank you cards, stationery, mommy cards, YOU NAME IT, she can do it!

What I love most about this company is that with Lil Bean Sprout you get a CUSTOM creation but then have two printing options {totally unique!}

DESIGN ONLY: Once the design is completed, you can take the emailed high res jpg file and print at any location of your choice or even do it yourself! No waiting and no shipping fee, how great is that?!?! This is a more affordable way to get the custom look you want for a great price and fast turnaround. If you are printing in a pinch, this is the way to go!  You can even opt to go GREEN this year, and save money by sending your photo card through email, post it on facebook or even your blog. Click HERE for some FAQs on how this works!

Or, if you are looking for EASE and convenience, you can also opt for Lil Bean Sprout to print your creations with their affordable printing.

PRINTING SERVICE:  Lil Bean Sprout offers Professional Printing on 5×7 Flat Card Stock in 4 finishes: Standard/Matte, Linen, Pebble and Pearl. You can click here to check out her Printing Prices.

Something important to note: when you purchase a custom card, Amy gives you one-on-one attention and will make changes until it is perfect.  She also offers customization with her pre-designed cards.

What is great about customizable stationery is that you have OPTIONS. Things like wording, for example. You can add a verse to change the Holiday to the one that you celebrate, or even turn a holiday card into an invitation or announcement if you like the design.

Or, if you see a font on another card that you like better, you just let her know and she can change it. She can even change colors to match your clothing in your photo or just change it to your favorite color combination.

Number of photos. This is a BIG one to me! With Lil Bean Sprout, you can have up to 5 photos on any design!!!  Amazing!  I love multi-picture cards – so cute!  Or, if a design has multiple photos and you only want one she can change that as well.  She can also change your photo in black and white at no extra charge.   Again, so much flexibility!

Hooray!  It’s a Tiny Giveaway!

One lucky winner will receive 24 pieces of a Custom Designed Printed Card!  She will design you a brand new card design to fit the colors and theme for any occasion *! And, if the winner needs more than 24 ea cards she will generously offer 20% off the additional sets.

Contest runs through July 11^th, 2010 at 5pm PST.   Here are the entry options, please leave a separate comment for each entry in order for your entries to be counted!

1. Click HERE, visit the Lil Bean Sprout website, and tell me the design that caught your eye! – 1 ENTRY
2. {Like} Lil Bean Sprout on Facebook – 1 ENTRY
3. Follow Lil Bean Sprout Blog – 1 ENTRY
4. {Like} Tiny Oranges on Facebook – 1 ENTRY
5. Follow @TinyOrangesOC on Twitter – 1 ENTRY
6. Subscribe to Tiny Oranges email updates – top right column – 1 ENTRY

GOOD LUCK!

{Disclosure: Lil Bean Sprout is a Tiny Oranges Sponsor}

I met PosePrints back at the SV Moms event in February and I was one of the lucky raffle winners that won a gift certificate!  Since I have my baby’s first birthday coming up in a few weeks {seriously, how did THAT happen?} I decided to use PosePrints to do a cute little invite for her!

Her birthday is July 2nd so I thought a 4th of July birthday theme was only appropriate!  And they had the CUTEST design! I was sooo excited!

Their site is so amazingly cute.  You create your OWN caricature to put on your stationery.  So, you customize the hair color, eyes, outfit, accessories, etc. etc.   Just go on their site and play around with it for fun!

So I did my little caricature, but then I had a question about fonts to see if there were more options. They emailed right back with more options.   Then, I asked if I could do the single barrette in red, and they totally could!  They were able to customize and had the most AMAZING customer service.

Here is my little invite…

And a recent picture of my ALMOST 1 year old!   The look in her eyes in this picture totally reminded me of the caricature!

I love fun finds & unique ideas!  I think you will love this company too…

www.poseprints.com

When I asked my daughter a few months back what she wanted to do for her 4th birthday she had two requests. She asked for a pajama party at our house with a bounce house.  Easy enough, I thought.  But then it is funny how a simple little party at home can turn into a major event!   But who am I kidding, I love this stuff, so I don’t know who was more excited –  the birthday girl or me. Since jammies were going to be involved, we made it into a sort of pretend sleepover party, as obviously 4-year-olds are too little for the real deal!  It turned out to be a really fun theme, so I wanted to share some ideas.

The first thing we did was whip up the guest list.   We limited it to the girls in her preschool class and close neighbor friends her age, but even with a scaled back guest list, it added up to 22 little pj’d people at our house!  And, she loved every minute!

The Invitation

I found this PERFECT invite called Sweet Sleepover on Tiny Prints.  I took a picture of her on her pillow for the picture. After all the details, at the bottom I wrote: {Bring your pillow and blankie/lovey for our “pretend” sleepover.}

We had it from 4pm – 6pm which worked out well, especially since it was a Friday afternoon, and to me, two hours is the perfect amount of time for 4-year-old attention spans!

The Decor

I had sooooo much fun with the decor!  I guess you can take the weddings out of this former wedding planner, but you can’t take the wedding planner out of the girl!   We didn’t have enough seating for 22 little bodies, so I called Classic Party Rentals in Santa Ana (but they also have other locations in So Cal)  to see if they rented kid-sized tables.  I spoke with Jessie there who was SO helpful and she told me I could rent two 24″ high 6′ long banquet tables.  Perfect. Then she told me about the COLORED CUBES for the kids to sit on!   They were my favorite part.  They come in all different colors and were the perfect height for the kid-tables. LOVED THESE!

I was lucky to find some great plastic tableware from Party City.  Those colorful tablecloths and were on sale for 50% off so they ended up being around $3.50 each.  Then I just bought colorful solid plates and napkins in various super bright colors.

So, my second favorite part of the decor were the  paper lanterns and stars!   Very fun and festive!  My husband just built the overhang pergola for our patio.  It’s not even done yet, but just with the main beams up I looked up and thought – hanging lanterns – hooray!   I went online and found them on Paper Lantern Store for SUPER cheap!  I got light and dark pink in all different sizes, 16 in all and it came to $30.  Not bad.  Small price for big impact.   The the iridescent stars are from Party City and we hung them all with fishing line.

The Centerpieces

I wanted something fun and colorful on the tables, but didn’t want to spend a ton of money.

I thought, what kid doesn’t like a big swirl lollipop?   I found these online at Oriental Trading Company.   For 24 (2 dozen) they came out to around $18 with shipping and everything, so a pretty good deal. Cheaper than buying in the store.

Then I found these different colored buckets for $.99  and shredded paper filler at Party City and bought  floral foam from Michael’s.   It was really easy, you just cut the foam to fit the bucket, then stick in your lollipops and cover the top with the filler.

They ended up being only around $7 / each.   AND THE KIDS went crazy for them!  They started slowing disappearing from the tabletops as the party went on…

Then on either side I put small stuffed animals to fill in the center of the table to go with the pajama party theme.

The Bounce House

Since a bounce house was her #1 request, I had to find a fabulous one.   I have never rented a bounce house before in OC, so I started Googling and located the Princess Bounce and Slide on Orange County Jumpers.  It ROCKED!  If you have the space I highly recommend the bouncers with an attached slide.  I have to admit, I tried it out too, and it was FUN FUN FUN! I was super impressed with this company them from start to finish. There are lots of companies out there, but I have to think this is one of the best bounce house rental companies in OC.  Every time I called someone answered and they were prompt, courteous, helpful and very professional.    The delivery person even called me the morning of to tell me exactly what time they would be there.   And if that wasn’t enough, they even disinfected the entire bounce house when they set it up!  It was love at first antibacterial squirt for this germphobe mom!

The Cake / Cupcakes

So, my friend Melanie from Sensitive Sweets did our fabulous cake and cupcakes.   I sent her the picture of the colors in the tablecloth and told her that we wanted something bright and fun that incorporated stars for our little night-night theme.

You know when you have something in your head that you think will be cute and then you see it in real life and it exceeds your expectations BEYOND?  That is what happened when I picked it up!   It was so beautiful I honestly teared up when I saw it!   Leave it to me to have a cute cake make me cry, but seriously, she put SO MUCH LOVE and time into it, it just really touched me.

She did a 6″ top cake for Emma and then, get this, for EACH child she did their initial on their OWN individual cupcake! So every child got a cupcake made especially for them!   The kids were sooo excited!  I loved, loved, loved this part.  And, if you can believe it, they tasted just as good (if not better!) than they looked! 

The Favors

I sort of geeked out on how excited I was over the favors too!  Honestly I am not a huge fan of party favors because of how most things get opened up and tossed aside.  I think they are sort of be a waste of money in my opinion!

What usually doesn’t go to waste is some sort of yummy parting treat.  So, to finish off our pajama party theme, I did individual goodie bags with a little box of sugar cereal, a Horizons organic chocolate milk and two little mini donuts – chocolate and powered.   The individual milks were from Costco and I got the little boxes of donuts and cereal at Ralph’s.

I put them in cellophane bags and got little Martha Stewart gift tags and star stickers from Michael’s.  On the tags, I wrote “Sweet Dreams” and tied them with a little bow.

So that was our little celebration for our now 4-year-old, and it was a party to remember!  The kids had so much fun bouncing we never even got around to any sort of real “sleepover” ish activity, but it didn’t really matter.   For older girls, though, I think you could do a fun spa-like theme..manis/pedis, etc. and go crazy with this theme.  But for 4-year-olds, give them the go ahead to wear jammies out of the house, a fabulous bouncer, pizza, a big swirl lollipop and donuts to take home, and you have got some pretty satisfied party guests!

Happy party planning! xoxo Jen

{Disclosures! Classic Party Rentals provided me with a discount & Orange County Jumpers & Sensitive Sweets are Tiny Oranges Sponsors.  Tiny Oranges is also a Tiny Prints Affiliate. }