1. An Outdoor Table-Cooler Combo
Cool Bar Rattan Style Outdoor Patio Pool Cooler Table GIF by Giphy
Want to share a few drinks with your friends outdoors, but don’t have a lot of space to do it?
No problem. You just need to get a little creative with your furniture.
Lucky for you, cooler-patio table combos exist. Quickly transform the lid to the cooler into a tabletop by lifting up. It may look like a futuristic contraption, locked and loaded to chill alien eggs, but it also serves to keep your drinks cool and the good stuff out of sight.
2. Keep Your Drinks Free of Bugs
Cupcake holder turned into a drink lid Photo by Eating Well
You’re lying by the pool getting your bronze on. You’ve got a drink in your hand, your favorite bathing suit on, and there’s not a cloud in the sky. Is this is what it is to feel like Jay Z and Beyonce? Your lips gently tease the straw, you’ve been anticipating this spicy margarita all week, you take a sip—resistance—you sip harder and discover a fly has Willy Wonka’d its way up your straw and into your mouth.
Newsflash – you do not have to live like this. All you need are some plastic straws and paper cupcake holders to keep your drinks bug-free. Cut a hole in a cupcake holder, place it upside down on your cup, and stick the straw through the hole. Now you can get back to relaxing.
3. Prep Individual Side Dishes for Easy Snacking
Pack side dishes into small lidded jars Photo by Eating Well
If you don’t entertain much, you may not have a variety of large serving bowls laying around. We can’t all live the bliss of The Barefoot Contessa. So, what should you put your apps, snacks, and side dishes in?
Turns out you don’t need serving bowls. Grab whatever small dishes you have and turn them into individually-packaged dishes for your guests.
Your friends will appreciate how easy it is to grab-and-snack. No fighting over who got more chips or whose slice of cake is larger. Bonus points if the dishes come with lids to keep the bugs out.
How shocking that you would promote the use of PLASTIC straws for the drink hack. Plastic straws end up in the ocean and end up in the nostrils of sea turtles causing nasty deaths.