An Easy DIY Piñata for Cinco De Mayo

I love a good DIY! And I love a good craft for a theme party! So, with Cinco De Mayo less than a week away, I thought I’d share this super easy DIY piñata craft!

Supplies:
- Cardboard box. Use your left over Amazon boxes, cereal boxes … any sort of cardboard box
- Scissors and a box cutter, for cutting and trimming the cardboard boxes
- Marker or pen
- Glue stick
- Tape or glue gun
- Tissue Paper
- Scissors or Fringe scissors for creating the fringe out of tissue paper

Step 1: Grab your cardboard and begin to trace your piñata shape. Don’t worry if you don’t get it perfect the first time … I didn’t! You’re creating an outline for the piñata that you’re going to cut out.

Step 2: Cut out your piñata shape using a box cutter, which I found easiest, or scissors. Then use that cut out to trace a second piñata side that you’ll cut out next.

Step 3: Cut strips of cardboard. I cut up 4 strips. You’re then going to cut them in pieces as you use tape or a glue gun to secure them to one side of your piñata.

Step 4: Complete your piñata by adding the second side and secure using tape or a glue gun. Before you complete step 4, fill your piñata with candy or confetti or whatever goodies you have on hand. I did not fill my piñata today because I’m going to use it as a decor for our Cinco De Mayo celebration, and my son is going to want to play with it. But be sure to fill it now before adding the cardboard strips all the way around, if it’s your intention to break it open at some point.

Step 5: Now that your piñata cardboard shape has been created, it’s time to add your tissue paper fringe! Cut your fringe to wrap around the piñata and secure using glue. I used a glue stick to attach the tissue paper fringe to the cardboard frame. It’s helpful to put down two layers of fringe in each strip to create more fullness. You will need to cut and paste to cover each inch of your cardboard piñata.

Step 6: Your piñata is complete! Hooray! Now if you’re using your piñata as table decor or as an accent piece, you don’t need to worry about adding a string to hang your piñata. If you wanted to use your piñata in the traditional way (i.e. hit it with a stick!), you would need to add the string to the top part of the piñata before you closed it up in step 4. If you decide to retroactively add a string to hang your piñata, no worries! Create a small hole with a tooth pick, then tie your string to the tooth pick and fish the tooth pick through the hole.

I hope you enjoy this craft as much as I enjoyed making it! Be sure to tag us on Instagram so that we can see how your piñata turned out!

Happy Cinco De Mayo, friends!

XO,
A

PS. If you’re hosting a fiesta, don’t forget to check out our Fiesta Party Kits and Party Sets!

How To Throw A Fiesta Party

Who wants to throw a fiesta?! There is no better party theme - for gatherings both big and small - than a Cinco de Mayo theme. All the vibrant colors, the energy of the holiday, and of course, the food. Tacos, anyone? Oh, and margaritas! Enough said, am I right?!

My sweet little boy, Ryan, recently turned one. (I can't believe I typed that! We have a one year old - Ekk!) So to celebrate such a big milestone, I decided to go with a fiesta party for his birthday. Pulling all the details together was so much fun! I'm sharing some of our party details so that you can also throw a fabulous fiesta birthday party - or a "just because" fiesta for Cinco de Mayo on Friday!

Loved our invitations from Minted.com! They were beyond perfect. Since all our family members live out of state (and not necessarily in driving range), I sent the invitations out 2 months in advance so that everyone both near and far would have time to mark their calendars and make arrangements, if they wanted to attend. I recommend sending invitations to your guests 6 to 8 weeks in advance for parties with primarily out of town guests, and 4 to 6 weeks for parties with guests mostly located in town. I'm a big fan of snail mail, so I went with a paper invitation. Minted is my favorite for purchasing invitations online. And you can always go the custom route and use a local stationer or Etsy shop vendor. But, evites are perfectly fine for party invitations, too! Some of my favorite places for electronic invitations are Minted, Paperless Post, eVite, and Punch Bowl.

I was completely obsessed with the cake and cupcakes Craft Cakes CLT created for the party! She executed my vision to the T! And bonus, y'all - they taste just as good as they look! Oh, and those cookies. Holy moly. Talk about delicious! Andrea with OneChic Cookie created these yummy and beautiful cookies. There were none left by the end of the party! The adorable cake topper is a banner from Etsy shop, Ay Mujer.

I seriously love a good margarita. So, I had to make sure we had plenty of tasty marg's for our guests. I know it's a childs birthday party, but let's face it - how many friends does a one year old have?! These early birthday celebrations are more for the parents, so don't forget to include adult beverages in addition to child friendly options. Keep scrolling to the end of this post where I'm sharing my tried and true margarita recipe!

When you're planning a party, think carefully about where you place food and drinks. Your guests will tend to gravitate towards the bar and the food. So for a casual party, like this, I decided to put chips and salsa on each table so that guests had something to munch on while sitting and chatting with each other. I didn't want everyone to feel like they had to stand and eat because tacos aren't exactly a one handed food. Don't feel like you need to keep the food located in one place - spread it out amongst the party area.

It's no lie that I'm a all about the details! So when planning for this party, there was no way that I would cut corners when it came to the details. Believe it or not, this was very easy to pull together thanks to a fiesta Party Kit. Serapes, pinatas, paper banners, colorful plates and napkins - everything you need to throw a fabulous fiesta is included in this Party Kit! By the way, aren't these mini pinata's a trip? I'm obsessed! I went to good ol' Home Depot for the cactus' and succulents, and wrapped them in tissue paper. It was an easy and inexpensive way to add color to the table and stick with my fiesta theme. We gave the succulents and cactus' away to our family and friends as parting gifts, if they wanted to take them. But we did keep one cactus for ourselves as a little memory of Ryan's first birthday party, and hope to incorporate it to our garden one day so that we can tend to it together once he's older! I sprayed cans gold to hold the "viva fiesta" paper flags. Cocktail napkins are always an easy detail that gets a lot of attention. These hilarious napkins can be found in my Etsy shop.

I had way too much fun planning the details of this party - can you tell?! So grateful to Paige Winn Photography for capturing all the details for me so that I didn't have to have my phone on me at all during the party!

I decided to make his smash cake myself, and it's one of my favorite recipes! Especially if you aren’t quite ready to give your kid all the processed sugar at age 1 - it’s gluten free, grain free and paleo friendly. And if there is any doubt as to whether or not Ryan loved his first taste of cake, just keep scrolling down! (Spoiler: He demolished it! And it was the greatest thing I've ever witnessed!)

Okay, so now for the good stuff - the margaritas! This is the recipe I used for the party, and it's my overall go to for a refreshing cocktail that is easy to make.

The Perfect Margarita
- 2 oz Silver Tequila (whatever brand! I prefer silver over gold)
- 1 oz Triple Sec/Cointreau
- 1-2 oz Lime Juice (basically, 1 medium lime)
- Garnish with sliced jalapeño peppers and/or cilantro for extra flavor

Happy Cinco de Mayo, y'all!

XO,
A.

For more information about the Party Kits, visit this page

Featured: Fiesta Wedding Inspiration

I absolutely LOVED this shoot, and I was so honored to see it featured on Inspired by This on Cinco de Mayo!! Last summer, Charlotte Wedding magazine asked me to design a fiesta-inspired wedding for the summer issue. (And, brides even voted the design to win a 2013 BOW Award!) To now have one of my all-time favorite blogs feature it, is so exciting! Be sure to check out the full feature here, and scroll through some of my favorite photos - all captured  perfectly by one of my favorite photographers in Charlotte, Smitten and Hooked. These two are amazing!

This whole shoot makes me want to throw a BIG party! Absolutely love how everything turned out… I couldn't have asked for more.  All the amazing vendors and talented wedding pros that participated in this shoot are nothing short of incredible! I'm so grateful to have had the opportunity to work with so many amazing vendors to produce this shoot for Charlotte Wedding magazine. They helped me bring this vision to life!

Photography by Smitten and Hooked | Wedding design and styling by Ashley Culicchia Cash, The Graceful Host | Fashion styling by Laurel Bendum of Charlotte Wedding magazine | Produced by Aleigh Acerni and Kellie Duff of Charlotte Wedding magazine | Shot on location at Brakefield at Riverwalk | Floral design by Lily Greenthumb’s | Catering and cocktails by Something Classic Catering & Cafés | Cakes by Wow Factor Cakes | Mexican cookies by Suarez Bakery | Rentals and linens from Party Reflections of Charlotte | Paper goods by Three Little Birds | Makeup by Casey Lombardi, Dollface Skin & Makeup Lounge | Hair by Lindsay Pizzuti, Mirror Bomb Studios | Gowns worn by the bride: Marisa - style 898 from Hayden Olivia Bridal, Intuzuri Augustine from Poffie Girls, Watters Blanca gown from J Major’s Bridal Boutique, Modern Trousseau Marena gown from Hayden Olivia Bridal, & Tadashi Shoji dress from Neiman Marcus.

XO, A.