Thursday, September 30, 2010

Halloween/Fall Decorations 2010

This past week I was able to decorate my house for Halloween/Fall. The rooms I decorate for holidays are my living room and kitchen/dining room. I love Fall decorations. I just love the smells and colors. Pretty much all of my decorations have come from Partylite. I used to sell Partylite so I was able to get a lot of my decorations then and I've also had a party every year around this time to be able to get more. :-) So here they are...

This is my dining room table. I used my everyday placemats and plates and added a deep red napkin and a pine cone to each place setting. The pumpkin centerpiece is from Partylite and I have a pumpkin scented candle (PL) in the middle with some leaves and mini pine cones around it. The leaves salt and pepper shakers I bought from Walmart last year.

A close-up picture of the centerpiece.

A close up picture of a place setting.

The bakers rack in my kitchen/dining room all decorated for fall. The candle holders are all from Partylite and the little pumpkin shaped candy dish I bought from Walgreens a couple years ago. I also used some artificial fall leaves to add to my decorations throughout my kitchen and living room.

Candy Corn, my favorite!!

The little table in my kitchen. The candle and shade are both from Partylite of course and the brick cat under the table was a gift from my mom. She made it herself, so cute!!

My stove... The lantern is PL and it has magnet covers that go over it for different seasons. These are the ones I have for Halloween. The pumpkin salt and pepper shakers my mom just got for me from Walmart this year.

My entryway table in my living room. I bought the runner from Old Time Pottery a couple years ago. Every thing else is from PL.

My coffee table. The bowl and candle are from partylite and the potpourri around the candle is from Hobby Lobby.

A close up of the bowl and candle.

My aunt gave me this haunted tealight house (PL) several years ago. I just love it!! It is sitting on the end table in my living room.

My entertainment center decorated for Halloween. All pieces are from PL.


Practical Scrappers Stamp Challenge

Our Challenge for this week was to use stamps. I found this cute birthday themed digital stamp online and used it to make birthday cards for my 2 nieces that just turned 10. I also used my cricut and Don Juan Cartridge to cut out the "10". Thanks for looking.

Monday, September 27, 2010

Family Fun around the Fire

This past weekend I found a GREAT deal on a fire pit at Home Depot. I've been wanting to buy one for a long time, but just hadn't gotten around to it yet. My mom told me they had them at Home Depot for $29.99 so I immediately went and picked one up. So last night I had my parents and my sister, brother-in-law and nephew over, so we built a fire and roasted hot dogs and marshmallows and made smores! It was so fun and such a great night for a fire. It was a beautiful clear, cool evening.  Here are a few pictures I took. I can't wait til the next time we can have a fire.




Thursday, September 16, 2010

Long weekend in Kansas City

This past weekend, Jake and I took a little mini vacation to Kansas City. Jake is a HUGE Chiefs fan and their season opener was this past Monday night. The first time they've played a monday night game at home in a really really long time. Not to mention they had made some updates to Arrowhead Stadium and this would be the first time we'd see the updates. It was a pretty big deal and Jake wanted to be a part of it. So back in June we started planning the trip and happened to get a deal on tickets in early July. We also got tickets to a Royals game for that day as well. :-)

So Friday morning we made the 3 1/2 hour drive to K.C. from St. Louis. We had reservations at the Drury Inn right across the hwy. from the stadiums, which was very convenient to everything we planned to do. Once we checked in and got settled we decided to go play mini golf and have dinner at Carrabbas Italian Grill. It was a great evening, minus the rain.


A picture of the Royals and Chiefs stadiums from our hotel.

Jake playing mini golf.

Myself playing mini golf.

Mini Golf.


Mine and Jake's drinks. Mine was a blackberry sangria and Jake had a beer.

Then Saturday we got up and had breakfast at the hotel and then spent the entire day at Worlds of Fun. An amusement park in Kansas City. Here are a few pictures from our day there.


We happened to be at WOF on Sept. 11th, so the flags were flying at half-mast.

The Mamba

The Patriot

The Zulu

Boomerang

The line for the Boomerang. As you can see there was no line!!! It was a really nice day and there were hardly any lines all day. It couldn't have worked out better. For the first few hours we didn't have to wait in line at all. :-) We were able to ride all the rides we wanted, multiple times!

Jake and I getting ready to ride the Patriot again.

Spinning Dragon

The Funnel Cake I got there. It was very good. :-)

Detonator - The scariest ride there in my opinion!!

The Mamba at dusk.

The Detonator at night. So fun!!

Then Sunday we just kinda relaxed at the hotel and watched  a lot of football. That afternoon we went downtown to the Crown Center and to the Plaza. Jake's uncle works for a carriage company at the Plaza, so we got to take a carriage ride as well. We had lunch at a restaurant called Fritz's Train Restaurant! It was so fun. Your food is brought to you by train!

Heading down to the city.

The outside of the Crown Center. This is a shopping mall where they have several little shops and restaurants. This is where we at lunch at Fritz's.

Fritz's Train Restaurant.

The inside of the restaurant. You can see the train tracks around the top. Thats where the train runs and brings you your food. So cool.

The little train bringing out the food.

Our food.

Then after lunch and a little window shopping at the Crown Center, we headed down to the plaza.

This is such a cool area of Kansas City. I had no idea it even existed. It has so much Spanish Influence and some of the architecture is replicas of real Spanish statues and fountains.

A close-up of the top of the picture above.

This is a little bridge that goes over a stream that runs along side the Plaza.

The little stream that runs along side the Plaza.

This is a beautiful bell tower that plays music every hour. So cool.

Beautiful fountain in front of the Eddie Bauer store.

A large fountain across the street from the Plaza.

The horse and carriage Jake's uncle took us for a ride on around the Plaza. So fun.

Jake and I on our carriage ride.

Then Monday we went to the Royals vs. A's game at Kauffman Stadium and then the Chiefs vs. Chargers game at Arrowhead Stadium. Here are a few pictures from both games.

Kauffman Stadium - Home of the Royals.

Inside the Royals Stadium.

A close-up of some of the fountains in the stadium.

Royals Stadium.

Every time we've been to a Chiefs game, we always see this fan to the left of Jake. Well while we're at the Royals game we see him again along with a super Royals fan. So Jake had his picture taken with both of them. :-)
The Royals ended up losing 3 to 1 agains the A's. :-( After the Royals game, we went back to the hotel for a few hours and then headed back down to the Chiefs game!!

Arrowhead Stadium.


Jake and I heading down to the stadium.

Tailgaters everywhere!

A new portion of the stadium.

A cake made for opening night. So cool.

The updated concessions area of the stadium. This is where I spent all of the 3rd quarter and most of the 4th quarter because it was pouring down rain. :-(

Inside Arrowhead.




Fireworks during the pre-game show.

The Cheerleaders performing before the game.

Waiting for the players to come onto the field.

The players before the game.

The National Anthem.

Go Chiefs!! They ended up beating the chargers 21 to 14!!! Yay!