Belleville IL

Sartorial Saturday–Oktoberfest 2023

Time for a look back at the outfits I wore to various Oktoberfest celebrations this year! I attended a record four Oktoberfests, which means I got to wear 2/3 of the dirndls in my wardrobe. I wore my very first dress from Rare Dirndl to Belleville’s Oktoberfest, but with a fairly new apron:

I wore one of my newest dirndls to St. Charles Oktoberfest, but I again switched out the apron:

I decided to go for a lot of color at Zootoberfest at the St. Louis Zoo:

And I paired my new “Surprise Me” apron with one of my oldest dirndls at Oktoberfest at Das Bevo:

Looking back at the places I went, I can say that Belleville’s Oktoberfest is still the most disappointing to me, while St. Charles is the biggest and best. Surprisingly, though, the zoo had the best pretzels!

St. Charles might have the best Oktoberfest, but you just can’t beat the setting of Das Bevo. It was the smallest one I attended, but just look at that gorgeous building and fun tent!

I’ll leave you with everyone’s favorite call for a toast!

Mural Bridge

I love public art projects and all of the murals that are popping up around our town’s Main Street thanks to the Belleville Mural Project, as well as the other, unaffiliated projects that have been inspired by it. I saw this one for the first time when we went downtown for Oktoberfest, and I love it, not only because it’s of one of our area’s most famous bridges, but also because the car parked in front of the building looks like it’s about to drive right across the river!

Happy Birthday to Me!

Today is my birthday!

It wouldn’t be a celebration for me if I didn’t get to hang out with Roald:

Apparently Grimace is celebrating his birthday right now, too, so Ryan went out and got me a special birthday shake…it was surprisingly good!

We watched a couple of my favorite movies today, including Cars, which I’ve been thinking about ever since we went to Disney’s California Adventure. I also wanted to wear my new Miss Candyfloss dress and go somewhere pretty…I picked this spot in downtown Belleville, which has a really fun mural!

The girls made me a beautiful birthday cake for dessert, too!

And a little more Animal Crossing, including a visit from Chickadee:

I had a very nice day, and as always, I’m sad it went by so quickly!