Celebrate summer with a pedicure gift basket!

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Ahh, summer! Hot days, warm evenings, daylight that lasts past bedtime, and one of my favorite things… sandals! I can go many weeks in between pedicures, when my toes are stashed away in socks and boots all winter, but once the weather warms up, it's important to keep my tootsies looking their best.

My sister and I love doing pedicures together, to keep our feet in tip-top shape, so I thought it would be a lot of fun to put together a little pedicure gift basket to prepare for our meetup.

Assembling gift baskets is one of my favorite gift ideas when I'm otherwise stumped; I keep a small stash of baskets and decorative boxes so I can put them together without too much planning. In this case, I was able to pick up everything for my presentation right at Walgreens, so it took almost no time at all to go from an idea to assembling it on the kitchen table.

When I'm putting together a basket, I'll always start with a theme; movie night, romantic date, get well soon baskets are all things I've done in the past. I follow a simple formula: Something to read or watch, something to eat or drink, and then of course items required to fit the theme I'm going after.

In this case, I chose a bag of my favorite chocolates, and Coca-Colas for both of us, because who can resist when it actually has your name on it?!?!

I found my own name at Walgreens, where they had a big display that made it easy to search through lots of bottles to find just the name I wanted; they are also running a great promotion: Every Wednesday through Friday from 4:00 to 7:00pm, Buy 1 Coca-Cola 20 oz. bottle and Get 1 Free 20 oz. bottle to share! You can load the coupon instantly on the Walgreens app or click here for more information. Additionally, May through July you get 3,000 Balance Rewards points when you buy participating Coca-Cola products when you purchase $10 of participating Coca-Cola products.

For something to read, I put in a couple of my favorite “trashy” magazines; they're a small indulgence that I don't often buy for myself, but they're perfect for an afternoon of pedicures and hanging out with my sister. I pulled together a few fun colors of nail polish, some fresh-smelling lotion, and a “Nail Art Starter Kit” that was just begging to be added.

Looking for a couple of finishing touches, I snagged a couple of cute Coca-Cola pint glasses and some new sandals. Walgreens really is the perfect one stop shop for a project like this, it made it SO easy to put together.

A couple of tips to help with the gift basket assembly:

• Size your container correctly for the things you have to include; like when you're plating food; choose a slightly smaller size to help you get that overflowing look; even just the illusion of the smaller basket makes it look really appealing and fun, like it can barely contain all the awesomeness inside.
• Create steps and layers of items; I put tall stuff, like the magazine and the sandals, sticking up in back, and then layer things in according to size. If you have lots of items of similar size, don't be afraid to use crumpled up newspaper to help fill in the space.
  
• Don't be afraid to take things out of their original packaging! I picked up this complete pedicure kit, but when I actually went to put it in the basket, it worked better as a collection of smaller items to put throughout the basket as space filler.
  
• Add a little finishing touch, like a ribbon bow on the handle, or jazz it up with paper shreds. (I don't know what this stuff is actually called, but I saved it from another gift I'd received, and thought it worked well here!)
  

So now that my toes are done, and it's gorgeous outside, I'll be relaxing here in the shade. What's your favorite way to relax in the summer? Want to see more great ways to celebrate summer? Get more #CokeHappyHour inspiration right here.