Down the Rabbit Hole

This past weekend we finally had my oldest daughter's birthday party.  I say "finally" because her birthday is in July.  We were supposed to have this party in early August, but that was in the middle of the whole water leak/demolished house debacle, so we had to push the party down the calendar.  She wanted an Alice in Wonderland theme, so I did my best to give her an Alice/Mad Hatter themed party.

We had loads of treats labeled "Eat Me" or "Drink Me":

 

Everyone got a crazy top hat when they arrived, and then went in the back yard to play croquet:

We had our tea party table set up under the magnolia tree:

The girls had tea sandwiches, fruit, and lots of sweets with their tea or apple juice (not too many takers on the tea!).  Then they played an Alice in Wonderland trivia game (with Alice in Wonderland books as the prizes).  Then we played a fun (but messy!) paint the roses red relay race game.  I had drawn a mural of roses on white paper that we taped up across the garage doors (it was a BIG mural). The girls divided into teams and did a relay race where each person had to run up to the mural and paint a rose red.  The girls loved it, but it was crazy and messy (so much so that I forgot to take pictures).

After that excitement, we opened presents, watched a few minutes of the Disney Alice in Wonderland movie, and then it was time to go!  The girls got an assortment of party favors, including keys and teapots that we made out of candy melts:

I think that it was a successful party.  There were so many things that I wanted to do, but didn't have time to do.  But in the end, my sweet (10 year old) baby was happy, and that's all that matters:

Warrenton/Round Top Antiques Fair, Part 2: The Loot

We found a lot of wonderful treasures on this trip!  Kari found so many cute things for her shop -- especially cute vintage hand towels and hankies, and a couple of antique redwork pillow covers that are to die for. I found a nice amount of antique lace, and I'm getting it into my shop as fast as I can.   But I also found a few things for me, which was fun.  I loved the bright retro graphics on these heavy linen towels shown above -- those strawberries!  Love 'em!  These are already washed and  hanging up in my kitchen.

And this fabric in the pic below -- I'm not sure if you can tell in the picture, but it is FLOCKED!!  I'm not sure what I'm going to do with it exactly.... but I love it!

I found a vendor with lots of these little Victorian calling cards that I like so much.  I think I may have gone a wee bit overboard:

I found some pretty laces, though not as many as I hoped for (though I may be unrealistic in that regard -- I can never have too much!).  I also found some vintage flax toweling fabric (the lace is on top of it in the photo), that I'm thinking of stitching on for my next stitching project.

But the most exciting find of the day for me -- by far -- was the Alice in Wonderland fabric!!!  I have one small remnant piece of this fabric, and for about 2 years I've been looking for more, with no luck.  Well, I stumbled onto 3 big pieces of it in this one lady's tent, and I started jumping up and down and shouting, "The Alice in Wonderland fabric! The Alice in Wonderland fabric!"  Let's just say it did not put me in the best bargaining position.  But no matter, that fabric was coming home with me no matter what!!  I may part with some of it -- some small pieces may show up in my shop -- but I think most of it is staying right here to be made into pillows for the window seat/library area I want to make for my girls.

What fun!  We had such a great buying trip, we're thinking about driving back up there this week....