I am so honored and proud to live in this amazing country of ours… it truly is something special.

Today is a little extra special for me though as I’m hosting my first ever, real party in my new home! Our little one bedroom apartment didn’t allow us the opportunity to entertain, so ever since the day we moved – I’ve been dreaming about it. When one of our neighbors told us that we can see some amazing fireworks right from our deck, I knew that was it – 4th of July party!!! We’ve been working hard to turn our new digs into a home and it has really come together in the last few weeks, days even. It might sound silly but I’ve “played” hostess at so many other events and I’m beyond thrilled that it finally gets to be my own. I’m serving the most delicious Champagne Sangria (look for the recipe next week) and a “build your own hot dog bar”; now you might be thinking that champagne + hot dogs are a strange combo – but don’t worry there will be beer too. Aside from sprucing up our house in general, I’ve also been crazy busy building an insane craft room/blog office and in just a few weeks I will be sharing an entire week long reveal along with killer giveaways hosted by all my favorite craft brands. It’s going to be a great summer and this is only the beginning!

For this layered sand centerpiece I actually colored the sand with something that you’ll never guess – blue and red food coloring! I shared this blog post a few years ago about coloring sand, stop by to learn the technique!