HELP ME! I'M FALLING

What else do you do when it is FALL but put up the Halloween decorations. Every year I tell myself that I'm just going to put up a few things this year but of course once I get started, I can't stop.

Someone's flying by

I woke Missy up taking this picture.
See her down there looking disgusted.
(How dare I)

I painted these pumpkins

Lit up at night

Added some purple lights and
leaves to my new picture board

Got busy outside.







The teenagers love this and laugh as I drive by.

This is me!

Ring around the Rosie

Hang in there honey!

KIMBA over at "A Soft Place to Land" is hosting a Fall Decorating party.
If you want some fun ideas or just want to see what others are doing go take a peak.

TRASH TO TREASURE

My dear friend Sue was wanting a way to display her photos of past Halloweens. We came up with a few ideas as we wandered around a couple of boutiques.

Then at the same time we both remembered something that her daughter had made a few years back.

An old window frame with chicken wire stapled to the back.




We hurried home and made her one. After she took it home and painted it and hung it, she sent me a picture on my phone. Of course I had to make one for myself.

We used large paper clips with buttons glued to the ends for hanging the pictures on it and old door knobs to hang them on the wall.

Fun huh?

I got the windows and door knobs from the old house that Bekah and Troy used to live in. I better go get some more because they are planning on knocking the house down soon.

CARAMEL APPLES, YUM!

Have you ever seen a caramel apple with no calories? Well I did the other day and being the great copier that I am, I decided that I definitely needed to make some. My nephew Logan helped me and boy did they turn out looking yummy.



Does anyone want the recipe? Well here it is...

INGREDIENTS:

8 good sized faux apples that you find up in the attic in the Christmas boxes and of course they are in the last container you look in.

8 colored pencils or you can use dowels but I always use what I have sitting around.

8 different ribbon colors and patterns or I guess you could use all the same. Sometimes these can be found tied on or wrapped around other projects.

A good old heavy duty glue gun and lots of glue sticks. I tried my glue pot but it didn't work.

A bottle of craft paint that you have in the basement that looks like the color of caramel.

DIRECTIONS:

Wrap the pencils with the ribbon gluing as you go so it doesn't slip around.

Poke them into the apples in the top.

Drizzle hot glue around the top very generously so it will run down the sides in globs.

Let it cool



Make sure your glue gun is really warmed up and wait about 10 minutes before doing the next one.

Paint the glue with 3 coats of paint. Spray with clear varnish and glue a bow on.




There you have it. Calorie free caramel apples. Yummy!

PUMPKIN TOPIARY ANYONE?

I've had an idea in the back of my mind lately that I wanted to make a pumpkin topiary.
I wanted one of these nice looking black pots but I wasn't about to pay a fortune so off I went to the local thrift store.





I found a pot for fifty cents but it was an ugly yellow so (hee hee hee) I painted it black of course. I went "shopping" out in my garage, which by the way looks like Halloween gone bad right now, and found some plastic pumpkins and some moss and leaves. Then out came the good old glue gun and 30 minutes later and a big mess (I have to make a mess because that is what I do best) I had my version of a pumpkin topiary.




For some fall ideas and tours, visit The Inspired Room because it's Fall Nesting Week!

YE OLDE GENE POOL

This is me and my sweet Momma.
I had lots of dark hair and blue eyes.

Here is my oldest Daughter, Liz. Not quite so much dark hair but her brother had enough to spare and she has blue eyes

This is my second daughter, Bekah.
Lots of dark hair and the bluest eyes ever.

Then my youngest daughter, Emma.
Once again, lots of dark hair and blue eyes.

Here is Zoe, my first grand child,
with her sweet momma Sara
Lots of dark hair and blue eyes

And here is Miley J,
Bekah's youngest.
Lots of dark hair and blue eyes.

And here is our new

Beatrice Renee, Liz's Baby.
Yup, lots of dark hair and....
blue eyes!!!

SHE'S HERE!!!

Little Beatrice Renee, Sept 30, 2008 (Brooklyn's birthday!) 6 lb, 12 oz, absolutely beautiful!!!!

Liz wouldn't let me post about it until she had a chance to post on her own blog, so as you can imagine I have been in heaven the last couple of days. You can read all the details on her blog... http://lizandfrankfamily.blogspot.com/

She's a keeper!!!

THE BLACK IS BACK

When I tore down the wall between the living room and kitchen I lost my pantry. Although I have managed to find places for everything, I just wanted a food cupboard so when the kids came over they would not have to look in different cupboards and drawers to find what they wanted. SOOOO..........



We've had this cupboard ever since we were married. I think we got it from Roy's Grandma's house. You should have seen me doing the happy dance when it measured exactly the same as the wall I wanted to put it on! Anyway we have dragged it everywhere and used it for all sorts of different purposes. At one point I found that Caleb and his friends had used it for dart practice and it was full of holes. So I took some of the old bead board from the wall I removed and put it in the middle panels where most of the holes were and then....... (wait for it...)
PAINTED IT BLACK!






I picked this little piece up at the dump. (I know, I'm shameless.) Happy dance again!!! I was exactly the same measurement!
I think it used to have glass in the doors but I used more bead board. And then yup, you guessed it... PAINTED IT BLACK!

And here is the final result.

SUN DRIED TOMATOES

I love sun dried tomatoes. I love to throw them on a pizza or in some soup or in my stir fry or just eat them. They make a sweet/tangy addition to anything.

Usually it takes several days for them to dry in the sun and you have to make screens and cover them and bring them in at night and ya-da-ya-da-ya-da. Well, here is how I do it.

I slice them up and lay them on my dehydrator trays. I sprinkle a little sea salt on them. Then I plug my dehydrator into an outside outlet and place it is in the sun.


There you have it. Tomatoes dried out in the sun! hee hee ;) And it only takes about 10 hours.

I WILL NEVER DUST AGAIN

Why should I when I get left such nice notes.



Just a note on my behalf though. I did some wood work out in the garage and forgot to shut the door to the house, plus we have a big dust field behind our house so if the wind blows and I leave a window or door open I get lots of dust, and I have lovely, lovely grandchildren running in and out all the time, and okay, I'm a lousy housekeeper. I'm a creator not a cleaner upper!

LET'S EAT CAKE

I absolutely love this idea. You take a salad plate, glue an upside down tea cup on the bottom. Add the glass bell from an old cheese plate, do a little baking and behold...... CAKE!








I used this recipe that I found on my friend Maryjane's blog. I used chocolate chips instead of the raisins
http://thebeehivecottage.blogspot.com/2008/09/more-pumpkin-bread-please.html















Then I found this cake plate at Savers for a dollar. I glued a candle holder to the bottom, threaded some ribbon through the holes and there you have it....
MORE CAKE!!!

SOMETIMES A GUY JUST NEEDS HIS MOM

Franklin never worries very much if his Mom leaves him for a little bit, but this time was a little different. Liz ran to McDonald's to get us all some food and it is exactly three blocks so you know she wasn't gone long.






Mugga ( that's Franklin for Grams)
where is my Mom?















I'm going to wait for her right here!

Don't look at me in my misery.

Please go away!

I guess I'll go sell vegetables while I wait then.

The older kids decided to set up a vegetable and lemonade stand in front of the house on Saturday. I could kick myself for not taking any pictures, but they had signs and jumped up and down at the passing cars. Finally they decided that if they went door to door they might drum up better business. I think that in the end they made almost $8.00 If you look real close at the picture you can see their bag of money. I'm not too sure what the sign says but we have a few that are just learning to read and write so we take what we can get. I think everyone got the message though. (Hummm, I wonder if Alyssa can see Missy good enough.)