Welcome to Milk Glass Home, your spot for seasonal slow living. Think food preservation projects, real food recipes, fun DIYs, and helpful tips so you can slow down and live with the seasons. Subscribe below to get all of my recipes, tips, and guides!
Host an Outdoor Reading Party📖🌳☀️
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Hi, Reader, Happy Labor Day weekend! It doesn't feel even remotely possible that it's already the end of August, but here we are. Tomorrow is the first day of September, and I personally cannot wait. It always feels like a breath of relief after the busy, chaotic heat of the summer! But yesterday, my friend Hannah and I hosted a party that was a breath of fresh air in and of itself. She mentioned the idea of an outdoor reading party a couple of months ago, and I was sold. What a great way to be outside, build some community, and just enjoy each other's company! It was such a lovely (and rather easy) event to throw together and I would love to share some tips to do it yourself. Basically, it's like sustained silent reading...but outside. We invited people to bring cozy blankets and their favorite book, and let them sprawl out around her farm. (It does help to have a beautiful heritage property with lots of heirloom apple trees to nestle near, but not required!) I posted some video clips of the party setup on my IG stories, so you may want to take a peek for the full look! We had three tables set up: 1) One as a welcome table to greet people and to collect donations for a local nonprofit that supports immigrants in our community 2) A book swap table where people could leave a book and take a book 3) An overflowing table full of snacks and treats You could keep it super simple and just offer snacks or just make a sign welcoming people to find a cozy spot and get reading! It doesn't have to be complicated or fancy. Hannah had all the tablecloths we would need, so I brought doilies and vintage decorations to enhance the experience. She's also a flower farmer and made several arrangements to decorate our tables. So charming! They really brought everything together. I made custom signage on Canva that I printed and popped into vintage frames I had on hand for my vintage business. Optional, but lovely! If you'd like to use the same graphics, I shared my file as a template on Canva. Feel free to customize it and make it your own! I did the same for the Book Swap Cards and the labels I made for the recipes, too. For treats, we ended up having far more than we needed (as it always happens!) and hadn't spent much at all. We probably invested about $75 into snacks and drinks, and could have spent less if we had time to make lemonade ourselves and if we bought a little bit less. I love, love, love to make my own treats because 1) I get a chance to cook and bake and 2) it's so much cheaper! Everything below was homemade except the pretzels, and I bought the produce from the store. We served:
One of her friends also brought a bunch of cookies and cupcakes, so we had plenty! For drinks, we served water, sparkling water, and lemonade, and definitely had way too many drinks, but that's okay. We did use bottled lemonade (I normally DIY), but sometimes you need to simplify. If this sounds fun to you, consider this your sign to host your own! Building community is easier than you'd think. People naturally want to chat and get to know each other, and I spent a good chunk of my time hanging out on a blanket under a mulberry tree with my family and friends. I brought my 7-year-old niece to help, and she was sad to leave because she made new friends and had such a good time. ❤️ And of course, it doesn't have to be outdoors! You could easily have an indoor reading party, too. Maybe with cocoa or cider? I'm in! Would this be helpful to write up as a post? I'd be happy to do that. Feel free to reply with any questions you have about it, too. Perfect Bites for Parties and Gatherings Have a wonderful weekend! I hope you get a chance to be outside with your people, soaking up the summer sunshine. See you next time! |
Milk Glass Home | Seasonal Recipes & Slow Living
Welcome to Milk Glass Home, your spot for seasonal slow living. Think food preservation projects, real food recipes, fun DIYs, and helpful tips so you can slow down and live with the seasons. Subscribe below to get all of my recipes, tips, and guides!
Hi, Reader, How are these long last days of August treating you? It's funny...as a blogger, I have a whole schedule for sending emails and talking about just the right topics, but right now, I feel like I need to step out of it and talk about something else. (Don't worry - I'll share recipes and helpful links below, too). I'm exhausted right now, and I wonder if you might be feeling the same. There's just so much going on, my to-do list seems piled higher than ever before, and I literally...
Hi, Reader, It is blackberry season here in Western Washington! The edges of our fields and forests are COVERED with invasive blackberry brambles (plus some of the native ones, too). Although it isn't exactly a good thing...it does happen to be a delicious thing. Every summer, my husband and I usually pick 4-6 gallons of blackberries to wash, dry, and freeze for winter cobblers and muffins. They're basically free food! But, there is nothing quite as lovely as coming back with buckets of...
Hi, Reader, It might seem like a bad idea to crank up the oven midsummer, but I promise, an old-fashioned crisp or cobbler is worth it. There is absolutely no better aroma that a warm apple crisp bubbling away in the oven, and this is the perfect time to make the most of all that delicious seasonal produce. Plus, I've recently shared some old-fashioned cobbler recipes, which I have to admit are EVEN EASIER to make than my go-to crisp recipe. That's not a criticism of the crisp at all - you...