Oh my, oh
my, oh my! The Yankeeween party at my house on Saturday was just the best day
ever- we had such fun and I think our guests enjoyed it too.
Before I get
too excited writing about the party, how did the week start?
A melt of
the deliciously vanilla tinged Almond Cookie kicked off my yankee week and this
was followed by the sweet cinnamon loveliness of Home Sweet Home.
Harvest
Welcome which I recently bought from the USA had its first burn and I’m pleased
to report that it is as heavenly as I expected it to be. It reminds me quite a
bit of Vanilla Chai (which I adore) but it is also laced with orange and
pumpkin. This is sure to be a favourite in our house for the autumn season in
years to come. I believe Harvest Welcome has now retired in the USA, so if you
do see it and want it, snap it up!
Witches Brew
took us through the night before the big day and what better forerunner could
you have for a Yankee and Halloween party?!
And then wow
– Saturday was just amazing!! Early afternoon there was a knock on the door and
the lovely Phil from Wolverhampton was first to arrive. So glad we got a few
minutes to chat to Phil as it wasn’t long before our guests started pouring in.
Lin & Julie chat while Jon looks on bemusedly!
Yankee Candle
Brand Ambassadors Steven Corfield and Rosa Speyer arrived a few minutes apart
and were soon deep in conversation! Our house has never looked so full and I
announced to the large group in our living room that we were still expecting 10
more people!
Rosa and Steven join the party
Within a
half hour or so everyone had arrived and the atmosphere was lively. We had 23
people in total which filled our house just about to bursting point!
Debbie, Mark and Jon look on at the more exciting action out of shot!
After
everyone had got to know each other a bit it was time to kick off some fun
Yankee games and we managed to spread people throughout the rooms a bit.
Ian had come
up with a real brain-teaser – 15 Yankee Candle anagrams! These were really hard
and you could see many a furrowed brow around the house. The whole house was
suddenly plunged into silence in every room – it was quite funny!
Ian realises his quiz was a bit difficult, while Austen and Ben compare notes.
I had come
up with a sort of ice breaker where I had asked random guests to name their
favourite Yankee Candle in advance. The quiz was to simply match everyone’s
name to their favourite candle. Easy eh (well maybe not!)?
Phil puzzles out what Ian's favourite candle is, hoping to get clues from his shirt.
And Ann and
Ben devised a fantastic sniffing game which took place in our conservatory. Ann
had made 8 beautiful boxes and all you had to do was sniff the melt in each box
and write it down!
Ann's lovely handmade boxes each of which contained a mystery melt
Steven and Rosa take the game very seriously!
Lisa and Charly think teamwork is the answer (while being distracted by Candy Corn coming from the giant pumpkin!)
Now, Steven
and Rosa aren’t long term Yankee experts for nothing and they proved their
knowledge by the anagram quiz and the (I think
Steven was out for a bit of revenge personally after not quite winning last
year’s quiz).
Ann reads out the results of her quiz, while fingers get crossed by the participants.
Ann and
Karen did really well on my quiz and
were the clear winners and Lisa and Charly won the sniffing game!
After the
quizzes I switched on our Spooky Town display to add a little fun to
proceedings. Here’s my video of this year’s
display with some suitable Halloween music (from Wednesday 13)!
Yankee QVC
had kindly donated a little gift for all our attendees so we handed these out
next along with a beautiful little 2016 Yankee calendar that Ann had made for
everyone!
Julie, Lin, Jon, Matt, Caroline, Jan and Tet are shell shocked that Steven and Rosa won two of the competitions!
Steven meets Ian and Austen
No Yankee Candle party is complete without Red Velvet Cake, kindly supplied by Ann.
or Red Velvet cupcakes with rice paper Yankee labels (kindly supplied by Lisa and Charly)
Rosa and
Steven then kindly offered to pose for photos and sign a few pictures for our
guests before they had to get on their journeys.
Here's our family album lol - me and Debbie with Rosa and Steven
and with Spooky Town!
Steven's candle was almost as popular as the man himself. Thanks for coming candle Steven!
All too soon
people started to leave but the fun wasn’t over yet!
Lin, Julie, Lisa, Charly, Caryl and Caroline are missing Steven and Rosa already
Once we had
a bit of breathing space and time, we decided to Skype our two lovely American
Team Yankee Admins – Zac and Deborah. That was really a lot of fun, so we made
it a transatlantic party!
Deborah joins the party!
and Zac too!
More chat
then followed and we were so pleased that a good dozen or so people were able
to stay into the early evening.
Ben passes on some Yankee wisdom
We had a bit of fun in our seance like room!
Sarah gets lost in our Halloween decorations
Lisa and Charly swap Halloween tips with Andy
Then the
party was over and we were left in a big empty house. We were quite sad I can
tell you.
Burning
during the day were – a candy corn votive in the conservatory (under a giant
pumpkin), a spiced pumpkin melt (in the dining room) and a jar of Red Velvet.
The day was
absolutely amazing and that is solely because of the lovely people who came to
our party that day. Thank you to everyone who brought something, your gifts,
wine and cakes were sincerely appreciated – your kindness and friendship is so appreciated
by both of us. Thank you Lisa, Charly, Karen, Ann, Rosa, Ben, Steven, Matthew,
Caroline, Sarah, Jon, Kate, Caryl, Julie, Phil, Ian, Austen, Mark, Jane, Tet,
Linda – from Andy and Debbie – we will never forget this special day.
So, well
Sunday was a bit of a downer to say the least, but I did pick up and burn a jar
of Harvest to wrap up a very memorable week. Harvest is deliciously spicy and
filled with clove, pumpkin and a light dusting of cinnamon.
See you
soon!
Additional photo credits – thanks to Sarah and Ann for some of these
photos.