surprises

Heart Balloons in a Closet

Valentine’s Day gets a bum wrap, all the pressure and expectations! I love Valentine’s Day because it is an excuse to do little surprises for people and make them feel loved. I’m going for less red roses and more thoughtful gestures. Here is a little surprise to get someone’s Valentine’s Day started out right. Fill a closet or cupboard with heart balloons and wait for them to get showered in balloons. It is super easy and simple to pull this off.

Materials Needed: 1 Bag of Heart Balloons, Lungs of Steel

Credits + Contributors:
All photography by Heather Zweig for Oh Happy Day
Art Directed by Jordan Ferney
Produced by Stacy Wichelhaus
Crafting by Caitlin Barker
Assisted by Harper Casimiro

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Tree Heart Installation

Valentine’s Day is one of my favorite holidays ever. I love the idea of doing grand gestures for friends or family. This heart installation idea is really easy but a fun way to surprise someone on Valentine’s Day. You can set this up outside someone’s window while they are at lunch so they can see it all day. You could even take it a step further and write something you love about that person on each heart. Yea for Love!!

Material Needed: Construction Paper, Yarn, Tape, scissors

Step 1: Cut out hearts of various shapes and sizes out of construction paper (tip – fold the paper in quarters to cut multiple hearts at once)
Step 2: Cut yarn of various lengths
Step 3: Tape the hearts to the yarn
Step 4: Hang in a low tree

Credits + Contributors:
All photography by Heather Zweig for Oh Happy Day
Art Directed by Jordan Ferney
Produced by Stacy Wichelhaus
Crafting by Caitlin Barker
Assisted by Harper Casimiro

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Chalk Stencils Surprise

When I discovered this spray chalk that comes in lots of colors I got excited about all the possibilities. You spray it on like spray paint but it comes off with water because its made of chalk. There are so many cool things you could do with this. Like make a big installation on a wall or a street or even a sidewalk. It’s super easy and a fun way to surprise someone.

For this stencil we printed out this free template and took it to Kinko’s to blow it up on their big black and white machine. We cut out the black letters and made sure to leave the center pieces connected by small pieces of paper. Once you make the template you can use it over and over.

All photography by Sarah Hebenstreit of Modern Kids Photography for Oh Happy Day
Art Directed by Jordan Ferney
Produced by Ashley Rose Kirschling
Type layout by Megan Gilger

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Balloons in a Phonebooth

I love doing surprises for my friends for their birthday (see here and here.) I’ve always wanted to fill a phone booth with balloons and then send someone on a treasure hunt to the booth and have the phone ring so the person has to open it to answer the phone and the balloons come out. We found this amazing phonebooth near the Golden Gate Bridge so we did a little shoot to share the idea in pictures. It makes such a great visual impact. It would be so fun to do this for someone. The trick is finding the old-style phonebooths. They are harder and harder to find! (I actually tried to do this once for Paul but the weather was terrible so I scrapped the idea.) What’s the best surprise you’ve ever given or received?

Credits + Contributors:
All photography by Heather Zweig for Oh Happy Day
Art Directed by Jordan Ferney
Produced by Ashley Rose Kirschling

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Newlywed’s Front Door Surprise DIY

by Chiara Alberetti Milott

So, one of your best friends just got married! How exciting! Now you just can’t wait til she gets back from her honeymoon so you can talk about what a beautiful wedding it was. You know the exact date she’ll be returning to her home, so why not surprise the newlyweds with a beautifully decorated ‘just married’ front door.

Materials needed: scalloped paper ovals (I used Paper Source’s scalloped oval cards in curry), 2-inch vinyl press-on letters (available at most office supply stores), yarn or string, assorted ribbons and streamers, a hole-punch, and expandable tissue paper wedding bells in different sizes (I found these at my local dollar store).

Step 1: Peel off your letters and center them on the paper cards. Punch two holes on the top of the oval. Thread the yarn or ribbon through the holes to create your garland. Be sure to thread the yarn from the back side of the card each time for consistency.

Step 2: Gather all your materials to take with you to your friend’s door. Also bring a scissors to cut the ribbons and streamers, and tacks to hang the garland and streamers. I also added some mini juice cans I had spray painted white, as a reference to the days when people tied beer cans to the newlywed’s car (do people still do that?!)

Step 3: Hang your garlands, bells, ribbons, cans and streamers.  For a cute touch, I also hung a little mason jar full of flowers from the doorknob, with a little note letting them know just who left their surprise.

Step 4: Run away! Oh yes, and hope it doesn’t rain!

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