A Little Sparkly Dust?

Hosted by "Playing With Dishes"
It's another week of "Christmas in July" with Felecia, our host who just loves Christmas all year round. This week, since I'm on vacation (and having so much fun...) I decided to share one sparkly holiday decor that I did for my teen daughter's "White Elephant" Party back in Arizona. We had one each December, for the last three years we lived there.

This is called Holiday Sparkle because the snowflakes had iridescent glitter and the gold wired ribbon was sparkly. It was the focal point for...

... this table centerpiece! I created my own glittered glass ball ornaments by swirling paints in them with glitter. So easy! The hurricanes were from the previous thanksgiving and the flower rings and linens, all deep, deep, clearance priced!
Hope you enjoyed my little sparkly holiday memory... It was a good year!

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Hosted by "Christine's Home and Travel Adventures"

Since it's also Saturday, we get to join our other lovely host, Christine for some sightseeing! Last Monday, my in-laws took us to the Bingham Copper Mines where 17% of the world's copper is extracted from Utah's Bingham Canyon. It is currently operated by Kinecott Mining Co.

It also happened to be just a few minutes drive from where they live!

Here's the fam looking down into the mine, over 120 years old!
With enough zoom power, Mr. Man was able to show us a digger...
I took a perspective shot for how big the "delivery" trucks are. You'll see one soon...
There you see the bottom of the mine... More digging!
Oh look! There's a school bus touring the mine. See how little it is compared to the "delivery" trucks? With the naked eye, it looked like an ant! LOL
Here's a piece of Molybdenite that they normally find there along with copper, gold and silver!
Here's one of the many display cases of the items used or found in this mine. They have a whole visitor's center on the site for the curious visitors like us! Beautiful museum!
Here's one of the "delivery trucks". I call them that because they "deliver" up the extracted dirt back up to the processing plants that separate the ores from regular earth! They create so much dust that so often, a watering truck follows or precedes them. We sure had an eyeful of how a mine operates at the source! So cool!
In the museum, they've found dinosaur bones and mouth fragments, just 70 feet down! Amazing huh?
We have so much more pictures, but I barely got back from another hectic but very fun day, so I'll have to share more next SS! Thanks for peeking! Make sure to join next Saturday and share with us the answer to this weekly question, "What did you see out there?"

TABLESCAPING IDEA: ("Brain" just had another idea) After visiting a museum, create a table reflecting that visit. Either it be just the color, books about it, the souvenirs you bought, anything and relive the memory by discussing it during dinner or whenever you do it!

A Little CIJ, SS and Q&A

Hosted by "Playing With Dishes"
We all know that Christmas comes with its own symbolism and commercialism. But if you really want to see the magic of Christmas, even in the scorcher month of July, you have to see the colors... Not just any colors, the three main ones, "red, white, and green"... There is nothing so obvious and beautiful than these three colors when thinking of Christmas, so for this week's "CIJ" with Felecia, I present to you...

THEME:
"The Christmas Magic's in its Colors"
INSPIRATION:
Red, White & Green
To me, Christmas is a time of reverence and gratitude so when I was thinking of what to put together, I didn't think of the usual adornments, but rather, I focused on the colors and what they meant...
Christmas time is a gift or rather to reflect on the greatest gift man ever received so I made the kitchen towel/napkin look like a long red gift box with two festive bows "melting" into the bowl. Exactly how I feel, I melt with gratitude during Christmas time.
Everything is focused on the main colors of Christmas, true that we have expanded on that to include all colors for whimsy, but when we think of Christmas, these colors surface to the top...
I opted to use something dark to hold the tealights to highlight this time of year is when we should have hope for mankind and within our own hearts...
I think it communicated "Christmas" well enough without the obvious "hallmarks", don't you?
Ok, let's see what this holder is made of... It's got three leaves with a bird on top of the branch they share! Yes folks, in other parts of the country or the world for that matter, birds and trees of all kinds get to enjoy Christmas, too! LOL
And here's the whole table... "Merry July Christmas!"

"Merry Christmas in July to all, and to all, a good night!"


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Hosted by "Christine's Home & Travel Adventures"
We can't forget that this is also Sightseeing Saturday with Christine. Instead of taking you to an exotic place, I opted to show you one of the grocery store area we live close to. These are what gets my children walking to from time to time.
Strategically, there are cement statues of animals! Like this beautiful squatting horse... Perfect to ride on with great shades in the summer time!
At the very end is this big hippo, and... (don't my children look comfy) ;-)
This bowing elephant greets us at the other end! Look at my son, he's showing you how fun each one is! ;-)

Now for the Q&A:
I was asked two major questions last Thursday.

"Where do you store all these stuff"?

Answer: I live in an apartment so storage is very important for my tablescaping. I have two big trunks in the living room that hold my accessories and my wedding china. I have a 10-opening bookcase that holds 10 of my dinnerware sets that's next to our dining table also serving as my buffet. Above it are wall shelves that hold my more "can use daily nice china" and vases. I also have some dinnerware at the very top of my pantry shelves. The more overt seasonal patterns are in the storage and gets swapped according to my designs and inspiration. My stemware are held in two small cabinets lining up in our hallway, and again, more are in the storage. I've been collecting since the late 90s, so I had to be creative with storage, each year and with every move.

"Do you eat at these tables or do you just set them for fun?"

Answer: We eat on 99% percent of the tables I set. My children love playing, "restaurant" the best where I get to serve them and they just wait to have their plates filled. LOL I invested in stain-resistant white tablecloths and use blankets no one uses anymore and wash them as spills happen to avoid any stain setting in. If I can't imagine a menu to go with the setting, most likely it won't get done. Plus, most of the "fun" tablescapes I do, it's between meals, so I make sure to take a lot of angle shots to recreate it someday.

Thanks for peeking! And a big thank you to our lovely hosts, Christine and Felecia!

This Is The Place

Hosted by "Christine's Home and Travel Adventures"
Last year, exactly, we were in Utah visiting my hubs, Mr. Man's family and they took us to..."This is The Place Heritage Park". It's a memorial park for the history of the Latter-day Saints or commonly known as Mormon people, like me! :-)
There's me with my beautiful fam... at the entrance- after the whole fun! Can't you tell humidity and heat doesn't agree with my hair? LOL

There were so much to do and see! I couldn't possibly show all of them to you! Blogger will shut me down for sure! Don't want that!

Here's what a schoolhouse looked back in 1865. Isn't it cool?! My children are on the right side, middle.

Oh-oh, what happened, why is my baby being punished? Oh, yeah, my teen helped demonstrate what happens when you misbehave back in 1865. You go to the front of the class, turn away and touch the wall with your nose, hold out your arms back and hold a book on each hand. Ouch!

They even learned how to write "July 4, 1865" in shorthand (right side ending in 1865) and the word, "flag" at the bottom. Neat huh?

There were goats and other farm animals like horses! See my younger daughter's head angle? She was ecstatic to see all those horses and even more excited that she can ride them!

See? What'd I tell ya? Look at that "I'm so happy" smile! That alone was worth the heat and expanse of the place! Oooohhh, all that walking we did! Our son was in his element when we found miniature buildings like this firehouse! It was such a respite for me not to worry where they are for about 20 minutes!

I was so glad when we found the Picnic Area! Here are the kiddos resting and bonding!

Two of the three men we were with... That's my hubby and my bro-in-law, Gary after we ate. Ready for more walking!

Ok, we got to ride in a stage coach, or whatever it's called. See me? I'm the one in the purple of course! (Just seeing if you forgot already) LOL

And we also rode on the trolley train they had going around. This is my darling and gorgeous, hubs, Mr. Man. Love him!!!

We found so many tin cookware and kitchen gadgets and cabinet coverings that we just had to visit the Tin Shoppe and here's the rather dry comic of a tin smith. He could deliver great jokes without cracking even one smile!

We had so much fun! I wish we were there again, but at least I got to take you on a virtual trip with us! Have a great INDEPENDENCE DAY!!!

Loco for Morocco

Hosted by Christine and Beverly

Well, since I'm quite homebound half a week with my hubs having the car for work, my mind again wanders to far away places. Lately, I've been seeing hints of Morocco everywhere. My lantern from the past TT, boxes of couscous and etc, etc...

You all know I've not been to most of anywhere so I have no words to describe Morocco rather than what a beautiful place. Mysterious, exotic, and oh so... pink?

(From Flickr dot com)

A map from WorldTravels dot com

Sahara desert



The vast sand dunes and great hotels

A purple night life... (I'd go just for that!)

The landscape...

I thank both of our gracious hosts, Christine for always taking the time to share her travels with us and to Beverly for her weekly dose of pink sunshine showers for us!

TABLESCAPING IDEA: ("Brain" is feeling exotic) Ok this is obvious, if you love Moroccan food, why not create a whole table in honor of the wonderful menu?