FLORIDA STATE FAIR

Wanted to share some old pictures from the Florida State Fair in Tampa.  My family and I went there quite a few years ago, for a first time visit.  There was lots to see and do.  Enjoyed the day!  If you have never been to your state fair it is something nice to do, at least once.  The one here in Florida is held in Feburary of each year.  Hopefully we'll get to go back again one day!

The freak show

Fallen Giant

Saltwater Taffy

The Organ Grinder with his Monkey

Fish Bowl Game

One of my favorites - Sausage and Peppers!

Everyone loves elephant ears!

Cotton Candy - Candy Apples - Popcorn

Making Saltwater Taffy

Going Fast!

Games and Prizes

Ferris Wheel at night

The Midway

Fishing for Ducks

Lots of Neon Lights

Ride at night

Everybody's favorite - Candy Apples!

The Old General Store
You could buy vintage things here too

The Old House - They had a whole section of how FL was way back then.
There was the store, the house, the outhouse, the school house and the church

The One Room School House

There was lots of food, music, entertainment, a tree man, a stunt airplane show, a flower show, animals, contests, demonstrations, variety shows, things for sale, fruits and vegetables, horticulture, art, clogging, and so on.  It was a lot of fun and we learned a lot about our state.

SUMMER MEMORIES OF BYGONE DAYS

I was watching some old video footage on youtube of vintage rides from Coney Island in  Cincinnati.  Also, as I was researching some photos from fairs and boardwalks, it brought me back to summer visits, while growing up, on the boardwalk, of Daytona Beach, FL. 

My grandparent's owned a hotel right on the beach of Daytona. We would go there in the summers some.  You could look out of the hotel window from upstairs right down on  the boardwalk. You could watch as the taffy machine would pull taffy to make it into bite sized pieces.  We would go to the bandshell in the evenings and listen to the music or watch the performances there.  We always enjoyed our walk along the boardwalk for it was filled with sights and sounds, smells, and carefree moments. We would sometimes get to take a ride on one or two of the rides that were offered there. 

The old clock tower - Daytona Beach

Daytona Beach Boardwalk

We also enjoyed the beach there. The cars would drive right up on the sand and park there on the beach. You had to drive very slow. The sand was white and there were usually lots of sandbars you could walk out on. We once got our picture taken by the newspaper. It was my sister, my brother in a stroller, and me.  My sister and I were pretending that the stroller had gotten stuck in the white sand and were trying to pull it out.  We are now all in our 50's, and my grandparent's have been gone many years, but the visits are still treasured memories in my mind.

My sister in the front, my brother in the middle, and me in the back.

The soft white sand of Daytona Beach (Postcard) The pier is in the background.  Below is a video clip of old Coney Island in Cincinnati

 

Till next time!

ALICE IN WONDERLAND 50TH BIRTHDAY PARTY

HI!  JUST WANTED TO UPDATE FROM MY PREVIOUS POST FROM 4/20.  I SAID THAT I WOULD POST SOME PICTURES FROM THE 50TH BIRTHDAY PARTY THAT MY FAMILY AND I DID.  HOPE YOU ENJOY THEM! YOU CAN SEE THE KEEPSAKE ALICE IN WONDERLAND BOOK THAT I MADE FOR MY BROTHER,AS WELL AS THE INVITATION WE MADE, ON MY PREVIOUS POST.

My mom made this wreath for the front door. I had seen it online. We just added faces of people who were coming to the party. There is a tutorial online as well. Check it out at  lark&lola.blogspot.com 

                   

The flower arrangement was made and brought as a gift to the party from one of the guests.  Nice to have creative guests as well!  The boxes are matchbook boxes just covered in paper. The little velvet couch was from my old dollhouse

This idea I found somewhere online as well but I don't remember exactly where.  We purchased a little tea set and a paper chessboard and set it up on top of a big old book. I made cutouts of the Alice, the rabbit and the Mad Hatter to sit around it. 

We made this paper shadowbox. You can download this paper craft online at paperkraft.blogspot.com

We made this cute paper craft cheshire cat. You can download this paper craft online at upstatefancy.com

We had a desk with an assortment of AIW things along with this pair of old spectacles and some printed out information about Lewis Carroll. He was very interesting to read about.

One of the favorite things I made. It was such fun putting it together! A miniature table with assorted chairs and little miniature things that I had. I made the cakes out of sponge and painted them.  Even little slices of cake for the plates!  I made little books out of cardboard and covered them in AIW book pictures.  The box in the background is a shadow box I made and I used paper cutouts of my brother and sat him at the table alongside the Mad Hatter and on the shadowbox with his own little birthday cake. The background door is paper. I used moss craft grass for the ground covering.

These are other miniature shadow boxes that I made. I now make shadow boxes and sell them on Etsy.

These are just paper cutouts from Alice in Wonderland set by real cups.

My mom and dad had this old clock with the little girl on the swing. It is an antique and beautiful! I made the paper cutouts to sit in front of it. The frog is holding a small clean paper envelope that is an invitation to the Duchess.

Another shot of the tea party and mirror. You can see the cards in the mirror. We strung playing cards on ribbon and hung them in the room

Bookmark favors I made

favors of tea and wax bottles labeled drink me

These are just those little wax syrup bottles. I glues on the drink me signs

This is an Alice in Wonderland pop-up book. I found it online at amazon.com

We made the colored shortbread cookies. The plain ones are store bought chess shortbread cookies.  The tweedledee and tweedledum are paper.

One of the salads we served with real edible flowers!

Our little Alice from the original book - costume made by my mom

ALICE IN WONDERLAND BIRTHDAY PARTY BOOK

My brother was turning 50 and we needed to come up with a theme for his party. Being an artist who is always so creative we wanted to come up with something that would impress him. It took time and work to put it all together but was more than worth it. And most of all - it took him by surprise and he totally loved it!! I also made a video of his life and put some Alice in Wonderland stuff in it as well.

Being that the new Alice in Wonderland movie came out around the same time period we decided to mix a combination of old and new Alice! I had always wanted to do an Alice in Wonderland party so this seemed a perfect fit for him.

Hope my pictures will inspire someone else and give you some helpful ideas too! My mom made all the costumes herself! We made all the food and cakes (2) and cupcakes. The hardest part of all was getting it all together in the yard at the last minute. My brother was back and forth at my parent's house and so we couldn't put things out until the day of the party.  There were things hidden all over the house, under the beds, in drawers and closets! And to top it all off, the day of the party it decided to have a pretty good rainstorm, right after we got things up! We had to run and take some things down, cover the table and wait till it passed (which was very close to time for guests), before we could reset and put out the food items! Because of the possibility of rain, we set up two tables - one on the screened enclosed patio and the other in the yard.It just seemed more Wonderland to have one in the yard.  A lot of our paper flowers got wet before we could get them all down ,so in some of the pictures they are kind of droopy! All in all it worked out ,although we were about ready to keel over ourselves!  We planned skits for all the characters and we made  my brother play the part of the Mad Hatter, of course!   My other brother was the March Hare and the two of them together were hysterically funny! I only wish I had gotten more of it on video! I played the Cheshire cat, and other members of the family and friends played the other parts. My mom was the Queen of Hearts since she was hosting the party. The costume she made still amazes me, especially the headpiece. It is made with red yarn. She also managed to make a bunch of hats for the hat shop. Everyone who didn't come in costume, for whatever reason, got to choose a hat to wear. We also made some of the guests into playing cards. Before the end of the party it got dark so we have pictures both in daylight and darkness. Everyone seemed to have a great time!

There are far too many pictures and too many things to post, but I will post quite a few. First I am posting pictures from a keepsake book I made for my brother. After that I will post the actual pictures from the party.

The invitation: Taken from an assortment of ideas I found online, this is what I came up with as the final one. I found these envelopes in the dollar store - a great find and buy! I glued in the saying and attached the sticker hearts. Some ideas for the invitation, as well as other Alice ideas and pictures, I took from Lenny's Alice in Wonderland website. Also, some of the invitation quotes, I took from loraleelewis.com. Check out both websites, they have some great stuff! Invitation reads:  COME GET LOST IN WONDERLAND!  You are invited to a  very merry un-birthday tea party.  Don't be late for a very important date -  (time and place listed) Wear wonderland best or whimsical hat, if you please. Your presence is gift enough.  Don's 50th.  RSVP requested by the Queen of Hearts.  - I also attached a metal charm that says royalty, that I found at Michael's craft store.

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My brother, standing next to one of his art pieces.  (notice the frog in the right hand corner! pasted in from the new Alice in Wonderland  movie)

My brother, when he was little.  This was the front cover. I made it to look like he was looking down into the rabbit hole instead of Alice.  Title reads "What if it had been Donnie who fell down the rabbit hole" I attached mossy craft grass to the rabbit hole and added the rabbit, then painted the sky area.  On the left hand corner of the book I glued on an old antique key and a miniature tea cup and saucer.

a picture of me when I was young pasted over Alice's face.

This was the inscription inside - There was also another picture of him as a young boy

This was in the beginning of the book.  I used a picture of a mirror and pasted in a picture of the white rabbit. At the top I attached the saying "Begin at the beginning, go until you get to the end, then stop" from Alice in Wonderland.