"You are not driving Mom!"

"Just let me put my shoes on and I'll drive you."
I don't think you can prepare yourself to hear those words out of one of your kids mouths, but I guess you'll hear it sooner or later.  For me it was sooner...as in this morning.
I had set a heavy board down, leaning it against the school desk, then turned around to grab something else and the board fell over on my foot. The rough edge scraped down the side of my foot after the flat part had finished mashing it, so my foot hurt pretty bad. Of course it would be my right foot and all the rushing around to settle things was because I was trying to get out the door to run a quick errand before Superman got here.
I could have driven. It would have hurt, but I could have done it. Actually, I know exactly how much it would have hurt because I had Ri switch places with me for a bit so I could drive over a spot that still had ice and snow on it. Suffice it say that while it was possible for me to drive, I'm just as glad I didn't have to.

Snow, snow, snow, snow.....snow!!!

I know that ya'll must think we get a lot of snow, but we don't. Last year was extremely unusual, and so far this year is looking pretty abnormal as well. We ended up with 9 inches. You're probably getting tired of snow pictures, especially if you live somewhere that gets a lot of snow, but since we don't  usually have it, I just love these.

Self explanatory - swing set in the back yard.

Up close - and at a weird angle. Gotta wonder what she was doing.

 

Part of our neighborhood.

Another street in the neighborhood.

These remind me of pictures I've seen of places up north.

I just love all the snow on the trees. (Don't bother telling

me it's dangerous - I know it is, but it's still pretty.)

A walking trail we have not too far from here. Actually, the

back end of it loops fairly close to the house, but you have

to cut through the woods (almost impassable in the summer)

in order to get to it from our cul-de-sac.

A creek runs next to the trail,...

but I guess in order to deter people from walking close to it,

there is not clear path from the trail to the creek. Here Bree is

climbing down to get closer to it. I'm told that this photo was

snapped about a half second before the inevitable happened and

Bree took the express route down. I was also told that both she

and Ri ended up in the creek before it was all over with.

One of many snow ball fights that took place over the

last couple of days.

The girls had lots of fun, and since I didn't have anywhere I needed to go, it didn't bother me in the least. I got to sit back and enjoy the view, all the cold, wet, excited children, make snow cream and drink hot cocoa. It can go ahead and snow just any ol' time it fits this well into my schedual. :D

A White Christmas

That's right, a white Christmas. According to the news it was the first time snow fell on Christmas day in our area in over 60 years. We had a little snow on the ground last year at Christmas, but it was only a little left over from a rare, early snow we had the week before. The girls had made a big deal out of it, figuring they would never again see snow on the ground at Christmas. This time the snow started during the day and had everything completely coated before dark. Superman had come over early to open presents with us on Christmas morning and was planning on staying all day, but he ended up having to leave well before supper because the roads were getting pretty bad. He did manage to hang around long enough to have a snow ball fight with the girls though. Then they had another snow ball fight this morning with one of the neighbors' sons, who came down to spend Christmas with his family. I got a few pictures of the girls throwing snow at one another when they were cleaning it off hubby's car too. I'll see if there's a couple I can post tomorrow.

Merry Christmas!!

My best wishes to everyone for a very Merry Christmas!
I hope you each have a day surrounded by those you love, making fond memories for the future.

Homemade Gifts and Blessings

We were so blessed today.
When Ri, T.Lynn, and I went to pick up our milk this afternoon, Mrs. Diary Farmer met us out front with a big bag of of grapefruit and oranges. I was so tickled. Then a couple of the girls called me (they were very excited) and told me that Grandma's pastor and his wife had stopped by and brought us some packages the church had made up for their shut-ins. I kind of understand bringing something for Grandma, but I never would have expected them to bring a package for everyone in the family, plus one extra. There were apples, oranges, tangerines, boxes of raisins, and of course candy in each of the packages. Just look at all this fruit!

Mmmmmmm! See, I told you - we are very blessed.

Isn't that beautiful? Maybe I should start giving out fruit. I sure do like getting it as a gift.

Homemade gifts are another good idea. We almost always give out several homemade gifts each year. Sometimes it's just packages of baked goodies, but those always seem to be greatly appreciated as well.

Here are some things we made this year.

Ri cross stitched a couple of bread cloths. The other was

the same pattern, she just made the line in green instead of red.

You can find the bread cloth material for as little as $5, and it doesn't take much thread. You can pick up an inexpensive basket; I've found red and greeen ones in the Christmas stuff, just the perfect size for a bread basket for as little as $1, and have a cute little gift for under $7. Or you could just wrap it around a loaf of cinnamon, or banana nut bread. We're doing that this year.

I knitted some dishcloths. I used this pattern.

I made all of the dishcloths above from the spool on the right, which started life the size of the one on the left. These large spools of cotton yarn costs less than $7 (and no, I don't mean it was $6.99). The colored yarn for the stripes was $1.99 for a small skein. You don't have to make the stripe, or you could make all the stripes out of the same color if you wanted to save a little money. I plan on keeping various colors around to use many times. A couple of the stripes were made from leftover yarn I had from other dishcloths I've made in the past. It takes very little of the colored yarn, so I have no idea how many of the stripes you could make from one skein. I have already made eight dishcloths, and I'll be able to make a few more out of the rest of the spool, so each dishcloth would cost less than $1 to make.

In years past I've also made cross stitched dish towels, embroidered pillowcases, dresses (for little girls, not for women because that would require fittings), decorative pillows, and the occasional craft. I also like to make cross stitched bibs, or hooded towels for baby gifts. A few times Ri has worked with me and we made matching sets that would have a hooded towel and a washcloth, or a towel and a bib, and once we made a set with all three. Home canned food is also a good gift idea. We've given away jelly, preserves, and apple butter, and this year I'll be giving my older brother some of the apple pie filling we canned because he really enjoyed the pie we made at Thanksgiving. After eating a piece he asked me for the recipe, but I told him that the only part of the recipe I could really give him was the crumb topping. The filling was some we had canned and my recipe makes 7qts of pie filling (add to that the fact that I don't really measure all the spices out - I just add and taste), so trying to cut it down for just one pie would probably be a shot in the dark. To make it a little more special, I decided to mix together the dry ingredients for the crumb topping and put it in a ziploc baggie with instructions on the outside, and then put that together with one of the jars of filling in a gift bag. All he'll need is a pie crust and a little butter and he'll be able to have another apple pie, this time hot out of the oven. 

Years ago I remember hearing my step-mother say that she loved to receive handmade gifts because she knew the person that made it had thought about her everytime they picked up the piece to work on it. That kind of stuck with me and I try to get around to making a few things every year.

Well then, he needs to run really fast!

I think T.Lynn sometimes forgets that Superman's main reason for visiting is to see her sister.  They could have been siblings for life the way they run around playing, wrestling and teasing one another. A few months ago, the two of them got into a huge tickling, wrestling match (in Superman's defense, it started when she tried to swipe his keys off his belt loop - again) that ended up with both of them on the floor trying to make the other one smell their feet. It's a good thing she was wearing pajama pants under her dress. At any rate, one of her favorite things is for him to throw her up in the air. WAY up in the air. The ceiling in the living room is 10ft. high at it's lowest point. I have no idea how high up it is in the peak, but I think Superman is doing his best to at least let her see the top side of the ceiling fan. She gets very high. It's a good thing I'm pretty laid back about that kind of thing. Note to self - NEVER let my mom see him do that.  After many months of being thrown in the air almost every time he came over, they decided to add a twist. She jumps off the the stairs and he catches her. They've worked their way up to more than halfway up the stairs. Of course, I'm not kidding myself to think they ever started on the first - or even the fifth step. I think they're up to the eleventh - I know she's jumped from the tenth numerous times. There are only 16 steps. I'm begining to believe the only thing that will keep them from going much higher is how far out it's necessary for her to be able to jump to clear all the steps. I'm glad she's little. I'm glad he's strong, but I do need to work on that absolute trust she's apparently placed in him. Not that I don't want her to trust him - I do, but there are limits to everything. When he was over a couple of days ago they were once again at the whole kid throwing thing. At one point he told her he was going to throw her, "...over that way.", indicating with a nod of his head toward Ri, who was, for the record, objecting. T. got a little confused (a side effect to all that rapidly changing altitude I'm sure) so I told her he was going to throw her to the left. Her response? "Well then, he needs to run really fast!"

Christmas...or a pagan holiday

First off, I'm not taking anyone's side in this. One of my favorite verses in the bible tells us that we must be convinced in our own minds with regard to our beliefs.  That doesn't mean we justify what we want to do by saying "Well, I believe...." and then go about acting any way we want. It means we are to search things out, pray about them, and ask others to get opposing viewpoints; just make sure they can biblically justify their position and aren't following someone else blindly or justifying their own selfishness.

With regard to Christmas, these are things I've used to help me decide about it.
1)There is (obviously) nothing whatsoever in the bible about it, so you have to draw your own conclusions about it using prayer and common sense.
2)Try not to use irrelevant bible verses to justify beliefs about it - as I've said the bible doesn't say anything directly about Christmas, so verses such as Jer.10:2-4, which is often used by people as an argument against Christmas trees, aren't relevant. Jeremiah was not referring to a Christmas tree; this verse seems to be describing a gilded statue, and even at that the bible tells us not to be afraid of them because they (the object) can't do evil or good.
3)As far as people saying it was originally a pagan holiday and that's why we shouldn't observe it, well, the days of the week are named after pagan gods and we don't have a conniption fit about that. Several months also derive their names from pagan gods. There is way more out there that originally came about through some pagan holiday or custom than we can imagine and if we spend a huge chunk of our time fretting about all of it we are really missing the point of living a faith filled life.  Don't get me wrong, I don't think you can go about doing as you please, or putting yourself in questionable situations and claim you have the faith to see you through it, I'm just saying you shouldn't go looking for problems. Paul tells us this in ICor 10:27 where he told the believers that they could eat with unbelievers if they were asked to, that they just shouldn't ask whether or not the food had been sacrificed to idols. You could eat the unclean food as long as your conscience was clear because you didn't know it was unclean; the food was not the issue.

I don't see any problem with observing Christmas. I don't worship any pagan gods, so in my opinion it doesn't matter if I'm doing something on the same day someone else is worshiping a pagan god. For all I know one of my kids may have a birthday on one of the pagan holidays, but just because I'm celebrating that day, doesn't mean I'm celebrating that god.
I do think you should consider other people's beliefs. If you know of someone who doesn't celebrate Christmas, don't invite them to your Christmas party. This would certainly fall under Romans 14, but it's also just common decency.
One final thought. Even if you're not worshiping a pagan God, you have only Christmas hymns playing all throughout December, and you attend all the church Christmas programs you can possibly get to, you can still be rolling about in sin with regard to the holiday. If you are so wrapped up in it that you turn the holiday itself into an idol then you are in sin with regard to it. We are all human and tempted to get wrapped up in that kind of stuff because of all the pressure society puts on people, especially at this time of the year. I've missed the point before, but I've also been completely ready to chunk it all on a year when several of my children were sick and one had just had surgery. My focus at that point had to be my children and not the holiday. For the record, we did still have our Christmas dinner that year, but my mom and aunt were responsible for it instead of me. They brought Christmas to our house and stayed to clean up the mess.

More of Ri's Sewing

Although she would disagree, Ri's sewing is coming along quite well.  These are the last two things she was sewing for the two little girls at our church.

It's kind of hard to tell from the photo, but these are tiered skirts. She has made several A-line skirts, so I figured she could use practice with a different style.

Her next projects are a couple of dresses for herself. We found a really cute pattern she wants to use to make a special dress for a photo she wants to have taken, but we always need to alter dress patterns quite a bit for her. She'll be making a "test dress" first, out of a less expensive cut of fabric (one we already had on hand), just to work out any little quirks in the alterations we make before cutting into the really nice fabric. I showed her the alterations that would need to be made for the pattern and we cut out the test dress last night. I can't wait to see how it turns out because I really thought the fabric she chose for the test dress was cute too.

One year and a week ago…

…I had my whole life planned out. I was going to graduate in the beginning of spring, going to get my driving permit, going to start online school for photography and start online college for theology.                

One year and a week ago I wanted to be a photographer and travel the world.

One year and a week ago I couldn’t be less worried about getting married and having a family. Maybe one day, but certainly not anytime in the near future. And whoever I married, his last name would not start with an “M” because my initials are MMD and nothing was worse to me than the idea of having MMM for initials.

One year and a week ago I met an old family friend and was chatting with her. She asked me about my plans and I explained all of the above to her (probably not in that order though). She asked me if I had a boy friend to which I replied “goodness no! I don’t have time for a boy friend and I really don’t want one either”.

One year and a week ago Superman (interesting name, no?) texted me and asked me if I liked him after a bit of small talk. I freaked out. I was only 17, I didn’t need a boy friend, I didn’t want a boy friend. A boy friend meant courting, courting meant getting married, getting married meant that all my plans would go BOOM. I didn’t want my plans to go BOOM, I worked hard on them. I didn’t want to see them go to waste. But I had one possible out. My family did the courting thing, he dated. There was no way he’d be interested after I explained it to him. He was Superman and he belonged with Lois Lane, which I most certainly was not! So one year and a week ago I began explaining  courtship to a normal, public schooled, dating, albeit cute, guy who had no clue what it was. I did everything possible to scare him away. “It leads to marriage”, “You can’t go in to it lightly”, “You do know that this is to look for a spouse, not just casual dating, right?”. I brought up marriage and life-long commitment as much as I possibly could. I knew if anything would scare him away, that would (he told me later that it nearly did), Well, needless to say it didn’t scare him away. He just kept saying “Ok, I get it. So, do you like me?” to which I would respond “This isn’t just about liking. It’s more, do you think we could get along well enough to get married?” to which he’d respond “yes, I understand that, but do you like me?” and so on and so forth all day long until I finally gave in and answered him that I liked him enough to give it a try. I didn’t have a crush on him, I didn’t “like-like” him, but he was (still is) a good friend and we got along well, so why not?

One year ago yesterday Superman asked dad if he could court me and one year ago yesterday dad said yes. I’m so glad because now all my plans have completely changed. I want to get married, I want to be a house-wife/stay-at-home mom more than anything ever. And I’m even willing to marry Superman although his last name starts with a “M” (I can’t convince him to change it, he apparently likes his last name. I gotta admit, I like it too!).

Yesterday Superman and I have been together 1 year and it’s been great. It doesn’t seem like it’s been a year since we had that talk over text, but it has been! And I am very glad that I didn’t scare him away.

Your very happy, 

It's December 4th...

...and it's snowing. It was unusual for it to snow the week before Christmas last year. This is highly unusual.
We didn't have our first hard frost until late in the season. We were still getting tomatoes well into November. But it turned off very cold a few days ago and now it's snowing. I'm glad the gas tank for the fireplace is full.

I'm in the home stretch now!

It's been a bit since I've posted, but I've been on a mission. I tried my best to relax after our really big Thanksgiving dinner (the one we had on the Sat. before) and just enjoy the two dinners I had on Thanksgiving Day (with Superman's family) and on Black Friday (with my Dad), and I did.  I didn't have to cook at all for the dinner Superman's mom invited us to, and I only had to cook up a batch of chicken and dumplings for my Dad, so both of the dinners were pretty low key, but then I set my sights on getting my Christmas shopping done early. I decided that I wanted to do my best this year to not be frenzied throughout December. I want to be able to slow things way down, focus on the truly important things, and spend a bunch of quality time with my family.  I was determined to get all my shopping done this week, and I've almost finished. I just need to buy some candy; a little for the girls' stockings and some for the gingerbread house (or whatever - last year it was a gingerbread train), and I also have to get a gift for my Dad. Then that's it - I'm done! I'm truly thankful for online shopping (I used this method for about 1/4 of my shopping this year), but it didn't save me from "The Mall" - ugh (wish I knew how to put that in some kind of Halloween type, creepy font). At least I don't have to do that again anytime soon. I plan on wrapping a few presents at a time for several days in order to get them all done and ready to go under the tree once we get one up. One of the things I'm looking forward to the most this year is joining in with the girls on the night they watch movies and string popcorn. I haven't done that with them in several years. I can't wait! 

This and That

We had our big Thanksgiving dinner (for my mother's side of the family) this past weekend. Ri posted our menu and we had no last minute changes this year. It all went off pretty much as I had planned, thanks to my mom. I had told everyone to be there at 12:00 (2hrs. earlier than we normally have it becuase of my older brother's work schedual) and that I wanted to draw names for our Christmas present exchange first to make sure it was done before my brother would have to leave. I had the names ready and waiting in a bowl when everyone arrived and mom took charge of making sure everyone drew names for their family, gathered all the information I needed, and took down gift suggestions while I finished up with dinner. By the time she was finished, dinner was ready to serve. Several people were unable to make it this year so we ended up with quite a few leftovers, but that's alright with me. After cooking for two days it suits me just fine to be able to pull supper out of the fridge with nothing more required than a quick re-heating. We'll have a small dinner with my father, step-mother, and younger brother this coming Friday, and since we had no plans for Thanksgiving Day, Ri was invited by Superman's mother to join them Thurs. for their dinner. His mom was kind enough to extend the invitation to the whole family, but as Grandma is not feeling well (I had to take her to the doctor after our dinner on Sat.), Kay has volunteered to stay at home with her.

I've decided that our ? (computer, sewing, school...) room will, from now on, be called the wreck room.  It sounds kind of fun just saying it. I'm sure people will get the inpression of a room filled with video games/equipment and a foosball or pool table, but you know the play on words will be plenty of fun for me.  I did finish the valance for that room last weekend.

Not exactly your typical "rec" room decor, but hey, just

perfect for room dominated by four sewing machines.

I thought the homespun went well with the bears.

A couple of them even have homespun dresses or bows.

I used a decorative stich to put a small detail on the underlayer.

I do enjoy my sewing machine.

My younger brother brought over all the dirt he used in his buckets this year and put it out on my garden. He uses new dirt every year because growing veggies in buckets tends to deplete the soil of it's nutrients. It wouldn't be so bad if he could compost the organic matter back into the soil, but the buckets won't allow the organic matter to get warm enough to break down and he has no place to make a compost pile, so my garden will reap the benefits. It makes me all ready to sit down and plan out next year's garden. My older brother and I got to spend some time talking with one of our cousins Saturday about gardening. This past summer was the first year she ever grew a garden so we encouraged her and shared a couple of tips. I hope to get another chance to talk with her more about it at our Christmas party; maybe even get both my brothers in on the conversation this time.

Mmmmm, spring isn't THAT far away! 

I'm already tired...

...and I haven't even begun yet! What am I tired for? Well just read the list below! You'll understand then.

We start tomorrow! NOOOOOOOOOOOO. Help!

"You're Leaving Me!"

That is what I've heard from my "baby" sister T. Lynn ever since Superman and I started courting. I heard this yet again today.
"I'm not leaving you!" I said.
She continued as though I hadn't said anything, "I can't believe your leaving me! What if your husband is mean and horrible and cruel?"
"Then you have my permission to beat him."
"Good," she exclaimed, "but I'm still going to be sad."
"But I don't think Superman is going to be mean and horrible."
She sighs and gives a fake pout.
"I'm not leaving you," I said.
"You are in four or five years," she replied.
"No, I'll be getting married, not leaving. Getting married is different than leaving."
"No it's not. You're going to get married and leave this house which is where I'm at and I'll be all alone!" (She fake sobbed here)
"You wont be all alone! What about Bree, Beenie, Kay and Mommy and Daddy? They'll be here." I reached down and helped her off the floor she had dramatically thrown herself on and made her sit on my lap in Mom's chair.
"But Kay is gonna leave and Bree is gonna leave and -"
Bree cut in, "I'm not going to ever get married, so I'll be here."
"You're going to leave eventually! You wont be here forever, " T. Lynn looked as though that ought to be common knowledge.
"Yeah, when I'm like... 20 or something!" Bree said.
"So then you'll be gone and Beenie'll be gone and I'll be all alone!"
"You wont live here forever T. Lynn." I told her.
"Yes I am. I'm going to always live here and take care of Mommy when she gets old."
Momma sent her a look that let her know she was highly offended.
"At least she doesn't think you are old right now..." I told Mom.
"I guess that's an up-side," Momma said, waving us up out of her chair.
"Yup," I said.
"You are going to get married and have your own home and then you'll have more children than you expected and you'll have to move farther away from me!"
"What?!" To put it mildly, I was shocked.
"You will." She nodded, again positive that what she was saying was completely true. I didn't feel like that was a good time to mention that moving into a bigger house eventually is our plan. There was no reason to stress her out more.
"By the time I get married, you wont even care anymore. You'll be a big girl, 13 maybe. You'll be happy because you'll be closer to getting your own room."
"Nah-uh."
"Yeah-huh."
"Nah-UH!"
"I wont be leaving you T."
"Yes, you will! And I'll be here caring for the elderly." T. Lynn said in apparent devastation
"Hey" Momma said. "This just keeps getting better and better!"
"I'm not saying you're old now. But you are going to get old some day." T. hugged Mom in apology.
Momma just looked away, totally offended now.
I just sighed.
Needless to say, the converstion went on for awhile; exacerbated by Superman calling me, claiming my attention to give him directions to some place while she wanted my attention to help her make a sun-catcher.
This isn't the entire conversation. Some of it's paraphrased and parts aren't even there, but you get the general idea. I feel like Aunt Bee from Romona and Beezus!

A Few New Projects I've Been Working On

Curtains
I've been working on this valance for the kitchen for about a month.

I used "Aunt Martha's Superb Herbs 4001" for the actual herb part in the center of each 'frame'. I designed the frame part around each herb based on a picture I saw of a corner design for an embriodery machine.

The basil was probably my favorite.

The decorative edging on the bottom actually looked like this, but I thought that while the whole thing would be overwhelming, half of it would make a nice trim. The tan color in the edging (not only in the stripe, but also in the cording between the black cording in the loops) is the exact same shade as the curtain. I ran a line of stitching down each side of the black stripe in the center to stabilize the trim before I cut it apart. I still ended up with a ton of black, gossamer like thread all over the place, but once I pulled out the black the rest stayed put while I sewed it in the curtain.

Then there were curtains for the sunroom. Sheers actually, but what else would you put in a room designed to let in sunlight? I could have taken a picture of the window on the other side of the room as well, but it looks pretty much the same, just a few different items around the window. The little things mixed in with the sheers are beads.

We got the idea for the strands of beads from a set of beaded curtain accents Bree and I saw some time ago in a home decor store when we went in search of a valance for the livingroom window.  Those were big chunky beads on thick ribbons, but while they were cute, they would have been a little heavy for the overall look I was trying to achieve in the sunroom, plus they were $20 per set of three. The girls and I were able to make all the beaded strands (10 per window, strung on pearl cotton embriodery thread) and buy everything else for the windows, including the rods for about what we would have spent on the beads alone if we had purchased just four sets of the ones we saw in the store.  There were five strands on each corner; three having a pattern and two which were more random. Bree and Ri strung most of the beads.

We used this pillow as the inspiration for the strands of beads.

I was using very inexpensive sheers and I wanted a swag effect, but they didn't have a swag available, so I sewed two of the longer sheers together to make the swag. Then I fashioned this little piece out of some of the beads and this semi-circle thing I think was intended for a necklace in order to gather the swag in the middle to hide the seam.  All in all, I think it turned out pretty well. Superman, who doesn't usually care anything at all about home decor, actually complimented us on them and told Ri he would like to have curtains like that in their home one day.
I still have one valance left to make; for the sewing (computer, whatever) room, but I probably won't work on that until this weekend.
For the record, I'ts not that I'm a huge fan of valances or anything, it's just that hubby doesn't really like curtains. He likes the clean, simple (ok - I'm fighting the urge to say stark - and I just lost) look of plain blinds. We have the nice plantation style blinds, and while they are nice for blinds, I just can't stand it anymore. We've lived here for 2 1/2 yrs and I'm getting tired of plain ol' blinds. I figured valances would be a compromise; a little color for me, and not too much "stuff" for him.  The sheers are window length, but they are sheers (plus, I staked a claim on that room - I always wanted one I could cram full of plants). And to give hubby his props, he has been very supportive of the whole thing, even when I bought a curtain rod for the kitchen window that wouldn't work and asked him to go back out that night and buy another one. He made an excellent choice.

This is a rug Ri and I made to put in front of the sliding glass door in the sunroom. She cut most of it out and pieced it. I appliqued the words and quilted it. I know, it doesn't exactly match the colors in the pillow or beads, but it does have teal in it and the red matches some of the pots I have in there. Also, since the piano is in there (and often the flute and guitar) I just couldn't resist this group of fabrics. You can't really see it well, but both of the lighter blocks have music measures in them and the fabric in the center is a toile print of people playing instruments. The black prints are obviously a good choice for a rug. And, if you look just to the right (sorry, just caught that - to the left) of the pillow above, you'll see another pillow we have in there that has colors that are much the same as these.

We got the idea for this rug in "Step-On-It Rugs", designed by Pearl L. Krush.

Something I've had brewing for awhile now is this nasturtium vinegar. Didn't it turn out to be a gorgeous color? I can't wait to try it in a vinaigrette. 

The rest aren't really projects, but I'll include them anyway.

I'm not about to take photos of all my fall decorations (Have I ever mentioned how much I love pumpkins? No? Well I do.), but I would like to show this little fellow because you can't imagine the debate that has raged between some of the girls about how these pumpkins should be arranged. I think some of them change it everytime it's their turn to do dishes.

Then there's T.Lynn's favorite decoration. Mr. Squirrel must grace the table throughout autum, or according to her, just any ol' time. The only problem with him is that the salt runs out of that acorn so quickly you have to be very careful.

I couldn't resist this little lantern I found the other day. I'm not much of a shopper, but every once in awhile I do have to go into a store, and I'm a sucker for lanterns and bird houses. I'll have to get a picture soon of the lantern I turned into a terrarium.

Interestingly enough, this little cutting from one of the pothos, rooting in a jelly jar, is one of my favorite decorations. It's sitting in the kitchen window and I just love seeing that little thing there everytime I go to the sink.
And finally, one of the few full shots you'll probably ever see around here. I figured it couldn't do much harm to show a picture of Grandma on my blog since all my cousins are posting pictures up on their facebook pages.

Not bad for 90, huh?  I might be biased, but I think she's beautiful. She's usually in a hurry to go to bed each night (at around 7:30), but she stayed up 'til 10:30 the night I was making the flowers for the cake, just so she could watch. :D I used two of her favorites; pink roses and violets - don't ask me why they look blue, they really were purple. I got tickled at her Saturday morning after I had finished putting the flowers on the cake. She was quicker than the two little girls at snatching up some of the extra flowers once I told them I had all I needed. I guess she has about 80 years more experience than they have of sneaking sweets.