Stop staring and start sewing!

Homegrown goodness

I picked this off my tree and ate it today.  We had 4 oranges make it after the freeze last year that nearly killed our trees.  Now we have 3. 

Oh, and in case you were wondering...it was delicious.

A little kitsch for my kitchen

I was so inspired by Beki's super fun Christmas trees I ran right over to my Super Target (it's super!) and sure enough they had a whole bunch in the dollar section.  I didn't want to be a copy-cat and I really loved this little silver tree so now it sits on my kitchen shelf spreading all sorts of Christmas cheer.

The kids worked on this last week and I caught the baby picking snacks off of it this morning.  But fortunately I took this picture before he figured out how to scoot the chair over to it.  I think it's pretty much icky but as a kid I would've been thrilled to have this around. 

And here's a cute ornament on my green sparkly tree (I got the tree last year at Michael's for 75% off the week before Christmas!) which is in my family room on a table and fortunately the baby hasn't figured out how to scoot the chair over to it.  I used the macro option for this picture.  Fun!

The Flu Fairy is visiting. His name is Ralph.

I'm so grateful we had the sense to invest in a carpet shampooer when we got our tax refund last spring.  And I'm grateful that I have a 15 year old who thought it would be fun to try it out on the "stuff" her brother left in the hallway (I thought I was being nice buying them that candy corn at 75% off, I didn't expect to see it again once it had been consumed though).

But enough about that.

Here is something cute.  The little characters remind me of the It's a Small World ride at Disneyland (in a good way though).  I love all the bright, happy colors.  It was published in 1964 which was an okay year (things definitely improved in '65 though).

Here are a couple pages from the inside.  The pictures look kinda grainy to me but it's actually the the way the pages look.

These kitties remind me of Richard Scary's Busytown folks.

\

Now off to find the Pepto. 

Darn kids.  When I told them to share I didn't mean this.

A place for everything....

I'm working on re-organizing my sewing room (ahem, my "studio") and I will show the horrifying, blood-curdling scream producing "before" pictures soon (maybe on Halloween?).  But in the meantime, this is cute and for all you know the whole room is incredibly immaculate because I can show this picture without showing the floor or countertops.  So just imagine a clean, organized and alphabetized room surrounding this:

This is where I keep my thread and just looking at it makes me happy. Spools on top, bobbins on bottom (oh, and I keep my empty bobbins in the little drawer on the left).

I got this at a local furniture store called The Potato Barn and I think it used to be a potato barn (gasp, you don't say?!).  Every so often I just go there to walk around and see what's new (not in the summer though, they have no A/C)

I could put my thread in color order but how boring would that be? Sigh.

2 dozen!!!

This was us 21 years ago today (dream gown from Laura Ashley):

This is what I came home to today. Some days he just puts the "charming" in Prince Charming.  How breathtaking.

And yes, we were of legal age.

Frittering my morning away

Yesterday I picked up the 80 pounds of apples (yes 80 pounds!) that I ordered from the produce co-op I'm in.  So guess what we'll be eating for the next 2 weeks:  apple pie, apple cobbler, apple gumbo, apple burgers, pan fried apple, deep fried apple, stir-fried apple, there's apple sandwich, apple creole, apple ka-bobs......you catch my drift.   So this morning we started off with apple fritters.  This were quick and easy and didn't require any fancy ingredients.  I did add some orange zest and juice from half an orange to give it a little zip but I think I might try lemon next time to make it zippier.

Anyway, these are what was left when that little voice said "Hey, you should so blog this!" and I grabbed my camera:

And a standing O from one of the judges (he'll eat anything that's not nailed down so I wouldn't take his word on it)!

These are my favorite pajamas of his.  I used this pattern which is fast and easy and I can fit the shirt over his big ol' head (I've adjusted the pattern to make it longer next time).  This fabric is a super snuggly brushed cotton knit that I found at this wonderful store while on vacation (for only 5.00 a yard!  eek!).  Anyway, I'm working on some sweet velour sleep sacs made from the same pattern and dang! they're turning out cute!

Ahhh....apples and snuggly jammies....I love fall!

It's official...Fall has fallen (finally!)!

Boy I'd like to sleep in on Saturday, but my eyes are trained to pop open at 6:00.   Oh well, I just decided to carpe the diem and here are the results:

We went to the nursery in the morning. We told the kids we were going to pick out a new baby but we came home with flowers instead (much lower maintenance especially in light of our little guy Skate figuring out how to remove his diaper during nap time and the resulting clean-up yesterday, and no we weren't lucky enough to find it was only a wet diaper).

I'll keep posting pictures as it matures (so long as it doesn't all die first since my thumb isn't the greenest).

In the afternoon we made caramel apples with real caramels (not those wrap thingies). It was surprisingly simple, not too messy and tasty to boot! We ate those while playing Monopoly later (where I spent a great deal of time in Jail but came out with some pretty cool tattoos).

I can see my reflection!

And in the evening we did pie!! I have one of those apple peeler-corer-slicers so there are always plenty of volunteers for that job. I used a Martha Stewart recipe for the crust (from her Pies and Tarts book). I hope it tastes as good as it looks!

It's 8:03. Must be pie time!

I slept very well last night (oh, and I decorated my shiny new front door but I have to take pictures!)!

You're welcome!

Pint o' paint: $11.98

2 new paint brushes: $6.97

Hours spent: 1.5

Smashing new entry: Priceless

Before  (how utterly un-inspiring)


After (lovely, ain't it?)

I LOVE it!!  It was all inspired by my new, $2.48 doormat I got on sale at Target (Oh, and we smashed one creepy little scorpion in the process.  ick.).

Orange again

Macaroni and cheese is definitely finger food. 

Oh how I love this boy.