Outdoor Home Improvements and Group Picnic!

This shop has been compensated by Collective Bias, Inc. and The Coca-Cola Company, all opinions are mine alone. #IceColdSummerMoments #CollectiveBias

Gather your friends, your honey-do list and refreshing Coca-Cola™ for an outdoor home improvement party and picnic!

Around here it’s summertime which means it’s time to tackle those BIG outdoor home improvement projects. While we LOVE crossing off our to-do list it can be a lot of work! So this year we got together with some of our friends to help each other do some of these projects together! Many hands make light work right? Plus it’s always a little more fun with friends. We added some music, shared ice cold Coca-Cola™ and ended with a picnic and s’mores for everyone. It was so fun we almost forgot we were working so hard! {Wink}

To get started, you’ll want to figure out the dates with everyone in your group. Each of us picked a Saturday and then everyone just showed up, gloves in hand, ready to work. We sent a text out beforehand asking for anyone with extra garden tools to bring a few. That allowed multiple people to work at the same time.  We had everything ready to go and right to work they went!

My hubby made this garden table for me beforehand so I had a spot to work on starting my seeds for the veggie garden and “splitting” some of the plants. I’ve got plans to stain and weatherproof as soon as it’s NOT in use! We made sure we had plenty of beverages for everyone available including ice cold water and ice cold Coca-Cola. I highly recommend picking up an aluminum tub to fill with your drinks and ice to keep them cool and within easy reach because there are few things in life better than sharing an ice cold Coke with your friends! Plus, you don’t want anyone getting dehydrated. 

Now for the best part! The picnic!! To prepare, I made these s’more kits complete with skewers and Coca-Cola for each guest. The Share-A-Coke 20oz Bottles were perfect, with the name of each person who came. I added chalkboard tags with a “take one” and tied them together with twine.

It’s time to share an ice cold Coke!

Right now Target has marshmallow roasting skewers with glitter handles, darling cutlery tins and these AWESOME plaid picnic tablecloths that just screamed picnic to me! I used some extra large pallets that we have collected as tables and gathered pillows and down comforters for everyone to use as seating. It was such a fun and relaxed way to enjoy our picnic. Watch out, those pallets are definitely going to be a future outdoor project. {Wink}.

Our picnic consisted of LOTS of fresh fruit. I love using fresh fruit because it doubles as a gorgeous centerpiece and you can eat it! Win-win! There is nothing better than fresh, ripe fruit a little warm from the summer sun. For our main course we enjoyed the yummiest turkey pot pies. You can get these at Target in the freezer section or if you are up to it, you can make them yourself! When I make them myself, I use pie crust from the freezer section as my little timesaving hack. I let it thaw and then roll it out on my counter top and cut to make the smaller pot pies. Otherwise you can make a large turkey pot pie for everyone to share.

Recipe:

Filling

2 9-inch pie crusts (you can use these to make into 4 smaller pies)

⅓ cup butter or margarine

⅓ cup chopped onion

⅓ cup all-purpose flour

½ teaspoon salt

¼ teaspoon pepper

1 can (14 oz) chicken broth

½ cup milk

2 ½ cups shredded cooked turkey

2 cups frozen mixed vegetables, thawed

1. Heat oven to 425°F. 
2. In 2-quart saucepan, melt butter over medium heat. Add onion; cook 2 minutes, stirring frequently, until tender. Stir in flour, salt and pepper until well blended. Gradually stir in broth and milk, cooking and stirring until bubbly and thickened.
3. Stir in turkey and mixed vegetables. Remove from heat. Spoon into crust-lined pie plate. Top with second crust; seal edge and flute. Cut slits in several places in top crust.
4. Bake 30 to 40 minutes or until crust is golden brown. Cover the edge of crust with strips of foil to prevent excessive browning. Remove foil the last 15 minutes. Let stand 5 minutes before serving.

We’ve created these printables with everything you need to throw your group picnic! Food and/or place tags, a banner, invites and we’ve even included a picnic menu that is perfect to plan and shop for your items. Before you head to Target (where you can get EVERYTHING we used for our picnic party), make sure to create a list with all of your guests so that you are able to pick up your custom Share-A-Coke 20oz Bottles for each person. There is also a SUPER awesome Cartwheel offer to receive 20% off your Share A Coke 20oz Bottles!  

It’s time for YOU to gather your friends and share an ice cold coke! Just swing by Target and pick-up your adorable Share-A-Coke bottles, s’more and picnic supplies June 18th is coming up soon and it is International Picnic Day! So even if you don’t have any outdoor projects planned you still have the perfect excuse to create those summer moments that to share with those you care about. If you are looking for more fun picnic-like activities and dates, we have so much more for you in store! You can find more awesome summer inspiration here!