Kansas Day 2012

This weekend, we celebrated Kansas Day. We spent our state's birthday outside with sunshine, friends, and buffalo burgers (of course).

Parties and Tablescapes

Today I wanted to do a post showing some of the tablescapes I've made and parties I've hosted. I love hosting and I love making a party center around a theme.


This was a baby shower for one of my friends who was having a boy. It was a bedtime theme and all the guests wore pajamas. I hung a clothes line that stretched from wall to wall and pinned jammies and blankets to it for my friend to take home for her baby boy. I also made little signs that said "You Hung the Moon". The tables were set to look like beds and each had a stuffed animal and a bedtime story that the Momma-to-be got to take home with her as well. I served milk and cookies and had a jar of marshmallow "pillows". This was also my first experience making a diaper cake! I topped the cake with a cute pair of baby slippers. I had so much fun with this baby shower!

As soon as my daughter hit about 9 months old, I began planning her first birthday party. The theme changed many times but ended up just being a "pink" theme. Sadly, a couple of weeks after the party I accidentally erased all the pictures we had taken from the camera. The few pictures that I do have are from various peoples' facebooks. So, this is the one and only picture I have of her tablescape. I served pink lemonade, pink snowballs, powdered donuts, pink cupcakes, chocolate dipped pretzels (with pink sprinkles, of course), and pink malt balls. I made big paper flowers that I had hanging in various places around the room. The party was a success, just wish I had more pictures to show for it!

Since my girl's first party was so time consuming to prepare for, set up, and take down, I decided to take it easy for her second birthday. She was (and still is) a huge Dora the Explorer fan so we did a classic character cake from Wal-Mart, bought some plates and napkins, and called it good. I did make some Explorer Stars (a Dora reference), but there was no tablescape. We had coloring pages on the table for people to color and hang on a clothes line over the table. We kept the pictures and are putting them in A's scrapbook.

For her third birthday, it was back to the tablescape! She wanted a Barbie theme, so Barbie theme she got! I only made a cake and cupcakes for our guests this time.

I recently hosted a wedding shower for one of my close friends. The theme was "romantic campfire". I served hot cocoa, apple cider, no bake nutella cookies, puppy chow (or "campfire crunch", as I called it), S'more-on-a-sticks, and Pirhouette wafers. I hung Christmas lights to give the room a twinkly feel, and set plaid blankets and pieces of fabric over bare table surfaces to give the room cohesion. The venue we used is the coffee shop on my college campus so it was very cozy and felt like a living room. I think the guests enjoyed themselves!



As much as I love planning, decorating, and hosting parties, my favorite part is being with friends and family and watching everyone enjoy themselves!

Puppet Theatre

Even though it doesn't necessarily feel like it outside, it is winter. I have a feeling things will start cooling down quite a bit and impromptu trips to the park won't be as possible. In light of beating the winter blues, I've been on the lookout for fun indoor activities for Miss A. I came across this idea on Pinterest (where else?).

1. puppet show theatre

2. the show begins!     

3. happy Miss A!        

Back to it...I hope!

Hello, all! I have decided to start the blog back up. I'm really hoping I can keep up with it this time. Am I the only one that has difficulty keeping a blog running consistently for more than a few months?

Anyway, I'm right in the middle of interterm-a month long semester in the middle of the traditional fall and spring semesters. I have a little more time now than I usually do since I am only in class for a few hours a couple days a week and I rarely have homework. I thought this would be a good time to try to get back on top of this thing!

I've decided to focus more on just my day-to-day life rather than having a specific topic or theme that I write about. I think that will make it easier to always have material and be most interesting to my readers (since most of them are family and friends that see us rarely).

Thanks for reading and for starting this journey with me...again!