1 Happy Easter Photo Card, Paper Culture
2 Eco Plastic Easter Eggs, Eco Eggs filled with jellybeans
3 Painterly Pastel Eggs DIY Tutorial, Papernstitch
4 Porcelain Egg Candles, Revisions Design Studio
5 Milk bottles, Acme Party Box Company with striped paper straws, Just Artifacts
6 Fun table setting with kraft table runner, chalk drawn utensils and colorful confetti
* To view images of our spring inspiration, visit our Pinterest boards.

For an eco-friendly way to set up a fun table setting, bring in Kraft paper as a table cloth that will entertain both kids and adults. Using chalk, you can draw utensil outlines as well as provide an artsy alternative for guests to draw on the paper. Scatter the tops with colorful confetti in spring shades of mint green, coral pink and canary yellow. Not only will this brighten up your Sunday brunch, but also your Easter egg dying station. For beverages and things, we like to reuse jars and bottles like the milk bottles from Acme and accent them with paper straws (always eco chic!) in the chosen color scheme.

A good way to emphasize recycling materials is to bring them to life in new settings. In addition to using eggs to dip and dye, try using them as candles. You can break them in half, pour in soy wax and light them. Or, if you rather save your eggs for your traditional hunt, go ahead and check out Revisions Design Studio’s porcelain egg candles with soy wax! They’ve already done the job for you so you can buy them as is and set them up for your tablescape.

As an eco-friendly business, we like to support all things that help out Mother Earth, so we were extremely egg-static when we saw these eco plastic Easter eggs from Eco Eggs, which are made with corn and are completely compostable. You can use them as favors filed with jellybeans for a more casual spring party or even hide them with little prizes and treats for the little ones for their Easter egg hunt. Cap off your party by sending your guests away with one of our fun spring themed Easter cards from your family thanking them for hopping along to your party to usher in Spring and to celebrate this season with all its promises of new life.

If there’s one thing we love it’s paper. And we especially love when people turn it into art. One new artist takes it well beyond origami, creating gorgeous 3-D art out of recycled paper. Ali Golzad is an artist living in Texas, originally from Göteborg, Sweden by way of Tehran, Iran. With a background as a graphic designer and creative director, his latest project asks us to question how we normally look at waste and see something beautiful: “Over the years I have developed my own technique using various mediums,” he says. “Aside from my formal graphic design training and time spent as a Creative Director you could say I am a self taught artist. My urge to create while still caring for our planet enabled me to look at ordinary objects in a new light and transform these commonly discarded materials into something meaningful.” We love the innovative use of paper techniques to recreate well-known figures. More pictures after the jump.

We loved it when LOMO revived La Sardina, a 35mm camera designed from a compact sardine can. The supercool wide-angle lens camera inspired hoards of people to put aside their digital cameras to take some seriously fun snaps. Now they’ve taken the redesign one step forward, by letting anyone purchase a white La Sardina & DIY Flash kit to decorate in any way they choose. That’s a whole lot more personality than an Instagram filter.

Keep it simple with pen and marker, or go crazy with glitter and fringe. The kit comes with a mini-screwdriver to forever encase and protect your creation. Go wild with the color flash attachments. It’s a great way of making a creative art even a bit more fun. Check out some artist-designed creations below.

From the geniuses who brought us the John Chamberlain Guggenheim Tour re-imagined as  Transfomers, Audio Tour Hack is back in a big way with a new downloadable tour guide. Told by experts from “kindergarten to fifth grade” their new audio tour guide, MOMA Unadulterated takes you through the landmark museum in a way unlike any other. Some would say art is best enjoyed in its purest form, through the eyes of a child. Now you can revisit that wonderment though a comical walking tour.

Ever walk through a museum and feel like you just don’t get the art? Taking all the pretension out of art, MOMA Unadultered gives a refreshing look at some of the world’s greatest artists. Take a walk through the fourth floor’s permanent exhibition and explore classic pieces by Jasper Johns, Cy Twombly, Jackson Pollack, Andy Warhol and more, all with first-rate commentary. Leave it to the kids to remind us: “It’s art. It’s just art.”

Watch the trailer below.

Artist Olafur Eliasson, known for bringing among other things, waterfalls to New York City, has just released a new project that is aiming to bring light to the world, literally. With his studio team in Berlin, he created Little Sun, a solar-powered light that can be placed anywhere, bringing a sustainable light source to the developed world where electricity is not always reliable.

Little Sun is available for people living in areas with normal access to electricity for $25 and for those living off the grid for approximately half price. The goal is to spread electricity to people who need it most. Five hours of natural light produces five hours of solar-powered light, and the battery has a lifespan of three years before it needs to be replaced. That’s a 90% savings over three years over kerosene lamps. It’s easy to see how this innovative business model and product can help out in a big way around the world. The light is small and practical, able to help light up a room, use as a campfire lantern, or as a bicycle light. Eliasson has big goals for the product, aiming to distribute 50 million lights by 2020. You can be one of the first to spread the light by ordering one here.

Ocean Terry Oversize Fouta Towel, Nine Space
Reversible Beach Chair, Julie Brown Designs
Lunch Pot, Black + Blum
Wooden Utensils, Sucre
Splish Splash Pool Party Invites, Paper Culture
Baby Float with Sun Canopy, Swimways
Lomography Camera, La Sardina
Summer Fun Paper Plates, Tag
Medium Tote Bag, J.Crew x Sea Bags

Start off your watery escapades with one of Paper Culture’s summer party invitations, find the one that best fits your pool party, and invite all your dear family and friends. Then pack a picnic lunch in Black + Blum’s ingenious lunch pot to eat with the crafty wooden utensils from Sucre. And, as always, a camera in fun colors to document the memories.

Needless to say, my daughter’s first pool adventure was a blast for the entire family filled with yummy food, refreshing water games, and laughs and relaxation. We practically had to drag her out of the water with promises of future pool parties!

How many times have you been at a museum or gallery and wished you could interact or play with the art? Personally I’ve had to restrain myself more than a few times. In one instance, in a gallery in Japan, kids were unable to stop themselves from playing with a large crocheted installation by artist  Toshiko Horiuchi MacAdam. As a result, MacAdam listened to her audience and built her first large-scale crocheted playground just for kids in Tokyo. The result was something straight out of a fairy tale.

Over twenty years later, MacAdam is still designing gorgeous crocheted landscapes. She works with her husband in Nova Scotia, Canada to build the playgrounds on a wider scale through their company Interplay Design and Manufacturing. The playgrounds are all natural, free from sharp metals and plastic, and thus provide a safe and creative environment for kids to explore. The nets adapt and take shape with the children’s movements. Lucky kids get to crawl, jump, burrow and hop through the sculptures. We hope to see more of these popping up in cities around the world.

We’re loving this new playground installation from  architecture firm a/LTA. A new take on the traditional basketball hoop, the structure allows multiples games to be played at once, as well as people from all ages groups. There’s a basketball height for every size. The “Arbre à Basket,” or “Basket Tree,” is installed in a children’s playground in Nantes, France. The game encourages anyone to pick up a ball and shoot for a hoop.

Designed with sleek steel beams, the basket tree reaches to the sky. It blends into the scenery yet makes a bold statement for innovative playtime fun. It’s a new way of looking at the game, as one that can accomodate and challenge kids and adults all at the same time. There are endless ways of reinventing the game, and the best part is that no one is excluded.

1 Prime Cut Apron by Sur La Table, $24.95
2 Bamboo Barbecue Cutting/Serving Board by Crate and Barrel, $29.95
3 Backyard BBQ Invitations by Paper Culture, $1.39
4 Burger Coasters exclusively at MoMA, $22
5 Oliver Appetizer Plates by CB2, $2.95 each
6 Barbecue Sauces by Williams-Sonoma, $12.95 – $14.95
7 Hamman Stripe Monogrammed Hand Towels by West Elm, $10 each
8 Mobile Foodie Survival Kit by PLANT, $26
9 Extreme Barbecue by Dan Huntley and Lisa Grace Lednicer, $8
10 Fyrkat Picnic Charcoal Grill by Bodum, $80
11 Tool Set with Hardwood Case by Mr. Bar-B-Q, $120
12 Everything’s Better T-Shirt by Stubb’s Bar-B-Q, $15

Fun items like the burger coasters and Oliver appetizer plates will be a smash at any summer party. And dear ‘ol dad can always use an apron highlighting all things meat as well as a grilling tool kit in a hardwood case. We’ve provided direct links to all of the items, but we’ve also created a Barbecue Mood Board on Pinterest as well. Check it out and also take a look at our other Pinterest boards while you’re at it.

We at Paper Culture hope that this will help you kick off your summer in the right way. Don’t forget to send an invitation our way!

The other day I saw a baby in a stroller, just barely big enough to hold a bottle, playing with her very own iPad. Although a bit of a shocker, it’s not so unusual these days that kids receive tablets or smartphones long before a pen and paper. While iPads can be a distracting toy, they can also be used for educational purposes to give your child a head start. But while there’s so much on the web we wouldn’t want our kids stumbling upon, fortunately a new app makes sense of it all: Happly.

Happly navigates the web so you don’t have to, keeping your children away from violent or inappropriate material. But rather than focusing on what it blocks like most safety nets, it focuses on the positive, offering a wealth of premium fun content. Think of it as iPad curation for your child. Happly has partnered with National Geographic photographers and award-winning children’s book authors to deliver a fun daily iPad experience that will keep your kid entertained and educated. If you choose to give your kid technology so early on, make sure the content is positive and worthwhile. Happly is a great way to start the conversation. What apps do you enjoy to use with your children?