Fall Adventures

This fall, we're excited for our Bucket List!

Best $1. Ever.

My husband is pretty amazing.

When we first got married I wanted to buy a fall wreath, but he was unsatisfied with the options available and wanted to make one instead (he's picky). So, he and my mom created a wonderful masterpiece.

The same has been true since. Today at Lowe's he was so very excited to see that fresh garland and wreaths were on clearance for only $1!

He looked at me with those eyes and a "please" expression on his face and we bought some. :) (How couldn't we, it was $1 and the garland was in great shape - still fresh!)

And, while I was at a baby shower for my cute neighbor, he and Adi put it up.
Gorgeous. I wish it had been there the day after Thanksgiving to have enjoyed it longer. But we'll make the most of it in the coming weeks!

Simply chic.

Oh, and the tin stars? 

We made those. 

Making Tin Stars

There was this one time that I used a left-over catering tin to make stars and I cut my finger on the sharp edge. I got the idea here (and she gives a better tutorial than I do, just fyi). 

We first fell in love with tin stars and lamps while visiting Mexico. 

One day, I'll make these, too. 

Until then, I'll be taking baby steps until I reach that point and this was a good way to start.

Step 1: Here's the tin in all her glory. We actually got this from our caterer at an office Christmas party.

Step 2: I cut off the edges. This is where it became dangerous. Those edges were sharp.

Step 3: Flatten it out. I had to cut it in half to do so. 

I bulldozed that sucker like a boss with the rolling pin.

Step 4: Print out some nautical stars. I printed out a couple of different sized stars. You can just find these by doing an image search on Google for "nautical stars." (Be prepared to see some gnarly tats while you're there.)

Step 5: Use a pen to trace the image on to the tin.

It will leave behind the indented image of the star, which you will cut out in step 6.

Step 6: Cut out the star, but leave about 1/4 of an inch around the edges. 

This is what it will look like after you have cut it out. Make cuts at the angles between arms.

Step 8: Fold the edges. You can use a ruler to do this, but I just re-traced the star edge and they folded easily (you can see that some of my lines were a litte crooked, which I fixed when folding). 

Fold away and you cut the extra from the points. 

Step 9: Fold along the middle lines - this will make it pop out. And you're done, unless you want to paint it. We didn't because we liked the reflection of the tin.

We put them in our tree for a little while, but then decided to use them to decorate some garland we bought for the banister. In the tree, we just had them sitting, but you can also poke a hole in one of the tips with a safety pin and add a hook to hang them. This is what we did with the garland.

I'll keep you posted on more progress towards making these:

Speaking of which, anyone have a tutorial (or Moravian star making artisan friend) to help me out?

Domesticity realized.

Ryan had a vision.

He was going to wire three sets of these to the railing. One right side up, the other upside down.

I wasn't quite sold. 

We have been seeing some pretty Christmas door sprays lately, but we wanted to do something unique. Something pretty. Plus, we like our door wreath, a lot (these actually match the wreath pretty well, too). 

So, while at Hobby Lobby, we bought a couple of these, used some wire to attach them to the railing, and voi la! 

Our own unique garland. 

Happy December! 

We might add a bow to the middle. What do you think?

Thanksgiving FHE

Last night we had some new friends from the ward over for FHE. 

I love Shiloh and her cute family. They are awesome. (Not to mention some of the smartest people I've ever known, I mean, Shiloh's specialty is debris flows. How. Cool. Is. That.)

We are so grateful for such a wonderful ward with amazing people.

We started with a 30-second song, prayer, lesson combo on gratitude (Adi's short attention span) and then made "Gratitude Chains" to count down to Thanksgiving. 

Who knew that Adi was so grateful for oceans; she drew picture after picture. 

Then we made delicious carmel-covered apples. 

So sweet. 

So rich. 

Soooo good. 

Almond-joy apples 

Peanut-butter M&M apples 

Three cute kids. (Adi loved Christian. He's eight; I'm not sure he was so thrilled. :) 

Thanks Shiloh, Jared, Laura, and Christian! We loved having you over!

Black Bats, Pink Cats.

Well, we finally managed to pull the Halloween decorations out of the attic. Our decorations consist of a box with a rubber spider that jumps out when you open it, and paper bats that my mom cri-cutted out for us last year. 

Binx now refers to our living room as the "spooky forest."

She has also decided that the chest at the foot of our bed is a great stage to entertain us at night.

Performances are now given nightly during the 8:30 - 9:30 pm hour.

Nightly performances include jumping and singing. Some of the time she faces us, but mostly she likes to see herself in the mirror. This performance is somewhat reminiscent of this from last year. 

It usually ends with an encore of jumping on our bed and then us tackling and tickling her.

(She's irresistibly tickle-able in her footed pjs.)

On a tangent regarding that performance last year, Adi is convinced she is going to be a cat for Halloween again this year. A pink one. She told a lady at the mall that on Saturday. Apparently, her cousins (both boys) are also going to be pink cats. I'm sure this will be news to them.

The Nasty Patch

We had this nasty patch of dirt in the backyard along the house. It was pretty much a litter box with wood chips. I had the dream (obsession) of covering it all up with garden boxes. So, the in-laws were kind enough to donate some old lumber to the cause and we made a Family Home Evening activity of it. (Actually, we had several FHEs on this subject. I think Binx has, "Faith is like a little seed. Plant it and it will grow." ingrained into her psyche sufficiently by now.)

We dug, cut the wood, and screwed everything together.

Laid and leveled the boxes.

And even though we threw out most of the top dirt, we decided a barrier might be good between the box dirt and the overhauled litter box.

After filling the boxes and cleaning up, pictures were necessary.

And planting eventually followed. 

It's pretty much a pizza garden, because we like pizza around here.

We had pizza (grilled, whole-wheat, thin crust, margharita) last night, and the night before. 

(And that's grilled cabbage ladened with Tony's.)

There's no shame in being a dinner repeater, right? 

The only problem is that our two potted herb gardens full of basil might not make it through the summer...

A little bit of this, a little bit of that.

Life around these parts is bu-sy and looks a lot like this... 

And this... 

But, that doesn't mean we're not having some fun. (:

For example, Friday, we stopped by the Sweet Tooth Fairy for some delicious cake bites... 

Saturday, my older brother, Chris, and I stopped by a place called Jim's for breakfast. Chris loved his Belgian waffle...

It's an art you know. 

The final product. 

We helped with HarvestMarket... 

And "helped" Grandpa with the desk project. Sadly, the sandpaper cost more than the desk itself. C'est la vie.

"I helping."

"I cleaning."

All-in-all, great weekend.

Now, if we could just buy a house... 

Cupcake Wars

Inspired by us (Ryan, Ryan's siblings, and me) cooking breakfast together in the spring of 2010, my father-in-law has implemented cabin cooking challenges... 

This year over the long President's Day weekend was Cupcake Wars. The funny, and frustrating thing about the challenge is that we each have a slight competitiveness that keeps things interesting. 

This challenge's theme, inspired by Adi's 2nd birthday and Hannah's 22nd birthday was Disney Princesses. (:

We had a little bit of this... 

Ariel and "The Little Mermaid" stole the show with gum paste... 

Courtesy of Erin and Tyler 

A little bit of that... 

Prince Charming and the dragon from "Sleeping Beauty" battled it out in frosted sugar-cookie form... 

Courtesy of Hannah and Andrew

And even a smidgen of... 

Voilà

 Pascal  hung out in Rapunzel's tower from "Tangled" in Cream Cheese frosting...

Courtesy of Ryan and I 

Best chocolate cake/cupcake ever? I think so. Taste the proof... 

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Speaking of cupcakes... Adi and I visited the Sweet Tooth Fairy yesterday for some last-minute visiting teaching surprises. And yes, we have some waiting in the freezer... 

Scrumdiddlyumptious!