Thanksgiving 2012

Thanksgiving is such a wonderful holiday in my opinion. It is a time to reflect on family and friends that you are so grateful for when life is going at warp speed.

Our Thanksgiving weekend started on Wednesday night when daddy got home from a long couple of weeks on travel. We were so excited to see him that we got all dolled up and went out for a fancy dinner.

This is Harper giving Daddy his birthday card, a turkey from her hand and footprints. His birthday was on Thanksgiving this year so it was fitting for the occasion.

 

It was so great to go for a nice dinner with my loves. Have I mentioned what my new winter drink is, a white russian. It is vodka, Kahlua, and a splash of cream!!!

Here is my sweetheart and I at dinner

 

After dinner we headed home and finished out packing since we wanted to get on the road bright and early the next day. Thanksgiving day we loaded up the vehicle and began out trip by listening to The Polar Express on cd in the car. I love that story such a classic. We had Thanksgiving with Grandpa and Grandma Zanoni and a relaxing evening at their house. Friday we braved the crowds for some great deals. We stopped and visited with nana as well in Albia and enjoyed seeing some of Joey's friends from college.

Saturday night we headed home since we had lots to do in anticipation for the following weekend.

The Haluska's are very thankful for a warm and loving home, a great group of friends that we love and that make the WC feel like home, and family that is always there to support us!

Blackberry Market

Over the last 4 year I traveled to the Naperville/Wheaton area quite frequently so  I have frequented many of the shops and restaurants. It is a wonderful area and I adore spending time in both areas since I am surrounded by family.

Recently a friend of my aunts began a journey to open a res truant in the Wheaton/Glen Ellyn area. I know her personally as well because she has helped me when I have been watching the She-She's.

On Halloween I was able to talk to her about her restaurant. It is going to be AMAZING and it makes me wish there were more places like this where I live. Friday and is shop small business day, remember to support your local vendors and shops on this day.

Below is a video about Blackberry Market
http://www.indiegogo.com/blackberrymarket

I highly recommend watching it. They needed to raise $15,000 and did it through donations through their town!

It Is Almost That Time Of The Year

Good Morning Everyone,

I don't know about you but I am starting to get in the mood for some Red and Green. I know I ma being totally cliche since it isn't even Turkey Day but I can't wait for the Mr. to carry up the tubs of decorations and to get busy.

I had to share something that I have followed for you a few years and it is great during the Christmas season.

Food Network does an email series called the 12 Days of Cookies. Different chefs from the channel feature a different cookie for 12 days!!



So go sign up today and get ready to be hungry and use alot of flour!!!!!

Wordless Wednesday

Halloween 2012 ( Yes I know it is November and I am just now posting a picture from Halloween, I must do better at keeping this blog up)

 

 

Harper was a very cute Oompa Lumpa!!!

 

Milk and Cookies Party Part 2

On to the next part of the party
The favor bags for the adults and favor kits for the kids.
A long time ago I saw on Pinterest how you could re-purpose formula cans and I loved this idea since we had an abundance of them. So I started saving them months before Harper's birthday and they were simple to dress up.
Inside the kits were crackers, crayons, paper to drawer on and a juice box. It was Perfect! Thanks targert for providing the the coordinated color scheme for the crackers! To cover the formula can I wrapped a simple piece of scrapboook paper around the outside!

The adult favor bags were simple brown paper bags with scrapbook paper to dress it up a bit! Inside was a red crush drink and my mom's special batch of "crack" crunch mix.

I had the favors in the foyer which made it very easy as people arrived and left to grab a bag!
Joey tackled a big part of the decorations as well and that was a hand drawn canvas all about Harper at 1. He did such a great job and it is perfect. It nows hangs in her room and I smile everytime I see it.

Above the cookie bar I had every picture from her monthly photo shoot on one side.

A Milk and Cookies Party Part 1

I started looking for ideas for Harper's party when she was 7 months old!! Yes I know that is early but I couldnt wait and there are so many cute ideas for children's birrhday ideas. I had 3 ideas going strong and narrowed it down to the milk and cookies theme by the time she was 9 months.  I loved this idea for the simplicity of the menu, and the idea of being able to do cute little touches along the way and in different areas of the party.
Let's start with the invitation. I looked, and looked, and looked and couldnt find one online that I really liked so I took the color scheme, and started to put together different ideas. I love how it turned out and although I spent a good week cutting out cookies, and milk bottles it was worth it at the end

 

 



The Color Scheme: I purposely picked something other than Pink! why?? Because I thought pink was to obvious of a choice and I wanted it to be something different because when Harper gets older I am sure she will want a pink girly party and we will have pink galore than!! The color theme was brown, reda nd white polka dots. I carried this theme through the invitations, decor around the house and favor bags.

Menu: The menu was extremly simple and was cookies and milk. I had chocolate and white milk and 6 differnt cookies. The cookies were Harper's Kisses, Fall Fest Cookies, Chocolate Chip, Grandma Eileen's Special Cookie, Chocolate Yummies, Yum Yum Balls.

 

Part 2 Coming Up!!!

 

 

 

 







A Year Of Harper

For Harper's Birthday party Joey made a video from this past year!! We had it playing on the tv for some of the party on autoplay. I love watching it!!! Thank you so much Joey for taking th time to do this!

We love you Harper Regina!!!!