Backyard Movie Night!

We did it!! I shared my Summer Bucket List with you last week and this one was a big entry! I wanted to do it last summer and we didn't so I was worried we wouldn't get to it again.  August is flying by, and the calendar is getting quite full! So last night we pulled it off! I found the best of the three "left-behind movie screens" that previous owners of our home left behind. We have spent lots of time puzzling over what they did with so many movie screens.   It's quite a mystery. 

The best one was really good! It was big and in fantastic shape! I think this would have had a stand but that is no where to be found. So I drilled a couple screws into the big tree (praying that the squirrels weren't home...that little hole is a nest!) And it worked perfectly. *Beagle for scale*

We had a little pizza party on the deck while we waited for the sun to go down. The feature movie was Planes: Fire & Rescue so I brought out our die-cast Planes characters to get the kids excited.

Bug spray was provided!

The Tiki Torches were great at keeping the bugs away and added to the ambiance.

I brought out our big Pottery Barn basket of throw blankets for everyone to pick from.

We had an assortment of seating including a big quilt to cozy up on. I pulled out some throw pillows too. 

We had some lanterns out to generally jazz things up because, you know, that's what I do!

[I see you, Cooper, checking Nana's bag for snacks.]

We didn't end up making popcorn! We ate too much pizza. And we didn't get to the S'mores we planned, either! Toddler antics and pausing for bathroom breaks made it too late once the movie ended.

This was a sweet moment with me and my son.

Our son is 2 and my nephew is 3 so there were a lot of toddler  antics but they were very good and made it through the whole thing! My nephew was quite entertaining. His little kid camp chair kept falling over (with him in it!) because the ground is not really level and has lots of tree roots. He'd pop right back up and say "I'm OK!!!" And it would happen again a few minutes later. LOL's all around. 

Technically this was fairly easy. My brother-in-law borrowed the projector from work. I realize that's a major part of pulling this off. If you don't have access to borrowing one, there are reasonably priced ones out there. The video player plugged right into the projector with an HDMI cable. We used an old speaker system that hooked into a computer for the sound. It  plugs in like headphones. Ran an extension cord from the porch and that's it!! 

This was truly a fun and special night! We think we might try and do a fall movie night now, too! It gets dark earlier so it might be fun! 

The dogs were exhausted after from all the fun, too.

I hope you enjoyed this! Thanks for reading!!

xoxo

jamie