It's a bird....It's a plane....No...It's a tomato cage!

Yes! I am very much in the Christmas spirit. And no, I have not even posted the jumping in the leaf pile photos yet...I'm running a little behind but Christmas has me so giddy I can't hardly help myself. My Dear Husband tells me it's too early to decorate so he wants no part in pulling the decorations down from the attic....or going to pick out a tree at the farm. I know I could do all that myself and trust me, I've been half tempted too....instead though, I shall make a tree of my own. This my friends is made from an old rusty tomato cage from our garden. It's still totally usable come spring but in the mean time I put a zip time on the end....wrapped it in garland....strung it with lights, and called it my tree! I think it turned out quite well and is a perfect beginning to my Christmas decor. ;)

Oh Dear Blog.....

Oh Dear Blog.....
I have not been ignoring you. I still love you dearly even though I have found a new passion. PINTEREST!! We have been living in our home for almost 4 years. I had given up hope on this old house and had begun to ask myself time and time again....Why did we buy you!? This website has given me a whole new perspective of our home. It helped get my creative juices turning and now I feel like the house is alive!!
We replaced our very ugly front door with a new door that I could not wait to paint red! I then promptly made a fall wreath to go on it.

Once I began the wreaths I decided to start making more for family and friends. Here are the ones I've made for the teachers for Christmas. (taken with phone....not best picture quality.)

I then decided to spruce the house up for the fall season with a few yarn pumpkins. They look so cute sitting on my new craft cabinet that I splurged on and bought myself. (also taken with phone.)

One of my new favorite stores is a store that I used to avoid at all cost. Goodwill! In the 4 years we've lived back in this state I have never stepped foot in a Goodwill. Well until this week. And bingo....I found exactly what I was looking for! This is one of my favorite new additions. It's a wooden ladder that finally allows me to display my grandma's antique pitchers. I've had them for a while just stored in the attic because this house had no where to put them. Aren't they gorgeous!?

 I'm excited about future projects that will include pallets, old windows, mason jars, and flowers! More to come....Can't wait!

Take a stand against cancer!

So much is already going on this fall! It has been busy busy! Just today I've got apple butter in the crock pot simmering, wreaths a'wrappin, the kids finger painting some canvas' to hang on my wall, frames being painted by myself and all the ideas swirling in my head as how I want to transform my little computer corner. I've dedicated this year to being a homemade Christmas. Not for the kiddos but for friends and family. That pledge has kept me quite busy, to say the least.

The point of this whole post though was to help take my stand against cancer. Over at Brassy Apple Megan is collecting shoe photos that will all be donated to help raise funds for research that will go to standup2cancer.org. For those of you who know me then you know that this is a passion of mine. Anything I can do to aid in the research of cancer, I'm in....And what more perfect of a shot than my little boy sportin' Momma's favorite shoes. :)
 

My new obsession

I'm always looking for something new to dip my toes into. Sometimes I get in over my head....Sometimes I discover that I'm really not that good at it and should keep on searching....Sometimes I find that it just wasn't what I expected and don't enjoy doing it as much as I thought I would. This year has been full of  soul searching between photography, gardening, canning, learning to sew, in two months I will go on my first zip lining adventure through the mountains and trying to get more in touch with my creative side. With all this being said, I decided I wanted to attempt to make my own wreath.

For my first wreath this took a while. The whole circle is wrapped in yarn. The argyle and flowers are made from felt. Learning to make a felt flower was a new task all in it's own. Needless to say, I am in love! I have a new obsession. These wreaths are beautiful for indoors or out. They can be made for every season, holiday, and perfect for gifts. I wanted this Christmas to be homemade since the funds aren't exactly flowing at the moment and I think I have finally found the perfect gift! Each wreath can be made to show the personality of the specific family that it's being given to. I am just so thrilled with this new project. Stay tuned for many more wreaths to come!!

Saturday Sneak Peek

I was just sitting here looking out the back door and it's hard to believe our neighbors to the northeast are in the middle of a hurricane right now. Here at the homestead it's a little overcast with a slight breeze in the trees. I'm sure that is all in thanks to Hurricane Irene also. I am thankful for the good weather this weekend though since tomorrow is our big annual back to school feast fit for a King!! Okay, yeah, this is the first back to school feast but eventually it will be an annual event! Here is a sneak peek of part of the table decoration that I made this morning.

This back to school feast isn't all my brilliant idea. I must give credit where credit is due. I'm doing this in full fledged Nie Nie style. But of course with my own unique twists. More to come of this feast later on in the week when I get a chance to post the pictures. K and E seem very excited about it though.

In the mean time our Saturday is moving on. I'm trying to work off a head cold and I guess it's time to stop pretending that I don't hear the kids, laundry, dishes, and yard calling my name.

DIY Headboard

From this....to this..... with a few short steps in between. :)

We have been without a headboard for....well, lets see. Always! Not only have we never had a headboard but our bedroom is always the one to get set aside. I was looking around on the Internet and saw a "how to" on making your own headboard. I loved her idea except instead of staining the wood she did stencils on it. I showed it to the hubs and since we had nothing better to do this weekend, we decided we would give it a try.

I love the natural knots in the wood.

Funny enough, the comforter set I'm asking for from Santa will most certainly cost more than our headboard did.

Wood: $23.03
Stain: $7.19
Screws: $7.50
Total: $37.72 for a 100% heavy duty wooden headboard.
And of course it's worth so much more to us since it has our own blood (yes, I slammed the wood onto my ankle) and sweat (it was only 100 degrees as we were working) built into it.

Makin' Jelly

It's been a pretty cool day.....We were sitting at Nanna's house with Uncie Tye and Aunt Jeni, who we hadn't seen in a while...I was looking through a canning book and stumbled across a recipe for some Jalapeno Pepper Jelly. I'm not sure if you've ever tried that jelly but it is SO GOOD! As soon as I saw it I decided that this would be my challenge for the day. We have plenty of homegrown Jalapenos and we have no clue what to do with all of them. I've never made jelly and of course I haven't canned the first thing but I figured it couldn't be that hard....Right!?

Daddy & K picking some peppers, potatoes, and zucchini.

Today's photo challenge for June 12th was "Sun Flare".....Perfect!

Preparing the peppers.....Maybe I should have worn gloves. My fingers still burn!

Cooking the "jelly." I truly had no clue what I was doing. Looks pretty though, right!?

WOW, that's a lot of sugar!!

Stirring, stirring, stirring....the whole mix.

Jars are loaded with the jelly. Now it's time to boil them.

What a mess!! This seriously took more pots and pan then I could have ever imagined!

The finished product. I'm so impressed, proud, excited...can I just go on and on!?!?
One Jar for Nanna who helped supply the jars, lids, and the pot.
One Jar for my Dad...Happy Father's Day!!
One Jar for our neighbors Mr. John and Mrs. Betty who we love.
and the rest for us....YUMMY! :)

Miscellany Monday: Our Visit with Henry

Surprise:
We had a nice little surprise this weekend. Not only did we have family come to town but we also had Henry come and visit us. For those of you who don't remember who Henry is you can check out Faith's post about Henry and one cute cute little boy named Lucas.

I am honored to be among one of the many wonderful photographers participating in this super awesome project to help raise money for Lucas.

Rain:
WOW! We got so much rain this weekend. Of course we had plans...Henry was here for a visit, the family was here...we wanted to go play at the doggy park...But of course not much of that went as planned. We went and checked the rain gauge this afternoon once the sun finally made a visit and in a weekend we got 2 full inches!! Since we couldn't make it to the doggy park the doggy's only did what was next best in rainy weather....Sleep!

Sun:
Once the sun finally decided he would also visit for the weekend we had major cabin fever and knew it was time to go play outside!!! Tire swings and bike rides...playing with friend galore! ;)

Henry's new sock friend, Sally Sock

Peek-a-boo, Flower Power Style:

Muddy Waters:
Our outside time didn't end with a simple swing and bike ride. Grilling and playing in the yard were on the agenda. Of course Keagan finds the muddiest spot in the entire yard (our future garden) and within minutes he was a muddy mess!

...and thank goodness Henry decide to sit out and watch Keagan during this adventure!

Thank you:
Thank you Henry for giving us the honor of sharing your weekend with us. It certainly made the rainy days shorter....Hope you enjoyed your stay! He is now off to his next adventure.