Corner Creeper

Guess what is creeping up, right around the corner????


Give up???



FALL!!!  That's right, my favorite season, my favorite weather, my favorite sport and my favorite clothes and accessories.  I even wore a cardigan to work yesterday, anticipating the crisp air that is to come.  Sweater weather and football are almost here and I can't wait!

I am so excited, I put together a fall vignette (yup another vignette) on Monday.  I decided to go with lots of white, candles, lanterns and milk glass (my new obsession).  Here it is...

I am in love with it.  I was ready for the moss and eggs to be gone.  The change is so refreshing.

Have any of you started fall decorating yet??

<div align="center"><a href="http://theletteredcottage.net/fall-table-decorating-ideas-link-party/" title="The Lettered Cottage"><img src="http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj29/LaylaPalmer/Linky%20Buttons/Fall_Link_Party_Layla-1.jpg" alt="The Lettered Cottage" style="border:none;" /></a></div>

P.S.  Harper turned 1 today!!!

21

Dear Sullivan,

You were born exactly 21 months ago today.  When you think about it, it really is not that much time to develop a personality all your own.  But you certainly have.

My independent Sag.  Insisting on doing everything yourself.  You have so many ideas and thoughts about how you want to do things, whether or not it is physically possible or makes sense in reality is beside the point.

Last week friday, when I picked you up early from daycare, I found you not in the toddler room, but in the baby room.  You were positioned between two 9 month old baby girls.  You had turned on the charm full board, giggling, eyes fluttering, stuffing things down your shirt just being silly.  Quite the little entertainer.

I should not have been surprised to find this written on your daycare report last week:



Yes, my little leader.

Thrashing, busting your way through the world.  Making us all notice you.

A year ago today, you just started crawling.  And now, you don't stop running.

You don't need to try so hard, but I guess that is just you.

Reach high, little one.

Love,
Mama

Drought

Sorry about the drought in project/craft posts.  I guess life sometimes gets in the way.

So I will share a cute gift idea project.

I came across this tutorial for appliques at a fun blog called Life of a Cheap Chickadee.  I am into handmade gifts so I thought it would be great to make some gifts for some new littles in my life and try out the technique on the tutorial.  I think they turned out great!

Here is the fabric I bought.  I was making gifts for 2 baby girls and 1 baby cowboy.

Ironing on the sticky stuff.

Then I cut out my patterns and ironed them onto onsies.

For Charlotte:

For Harper:

For Wyatt:

After I ironed them on, I used the sewing machine to stitch around the edges, just like on the tutorial video.  I forgot to take a pic of the final products!  Oh well.  They are cute, easy and loved by all babies (and their parents).  Try it!

Fetch

He has been trying to put this together all summer.  All of a sudden yesterday, it all clicked and he could do it.

Approximately 45 seconds after this video was filmed, he hit one of his shins super hard with the Chuck-it which almost resulted in the end of the world.  We are all ok now though.

P.S. this is currently my favorite outfit of his.

Alumni

Now that I am completely recovered from the weekend, I can finally get a blog post up.  This past weekend was the annual alumni softball/volleyball tournament in my hometown.  I have always loved that weekend and it is always something to look forward to near the end of summer.  I think it is a pretty unique annual event for a small town and it certainly draws a crowd. 

Per standard alumni friday fashion, there was lots of energy put toward drinking 32 ouncers.  Although I exceeded in that category, I had some epic fails in others (remembering the end of the night, at least making an attempt to drink in moderation).  It was a "blatto" (per my hubs) friday night.

And it did not go without some repercussions on saturday.  Mostly in the form of head pain, head fog, fatigue and general body aches.  Luckily, the weekend was not a total bust since I did get to spend lots of time at the Shangri-La De Machak. 

Papa Donny's newest creation, his custom outdoor fireplace that he just finished.

Every time I go there, there is something new to see.  I keep forgetting to do a pictoral tour of their new house each time I am there.  I will get to it, eventually.

Sully got to spend lots of time with his little friends, cousins and Papa and Gamma.

Diner days with Lucy...

Mustang Mavens.

Punch it, Lucy.  I will get us some tunes going...

Big boy biking.

Cool cousins.

Ahhhh, good stuff.

Book Worm

I have entered the book worm phase.  Apparently, it follows the sewing phase which follows the photography phase which follows the quilting phase.  Reading is my new love, my new drug.

In July, I decided it was time to get on the Twilight bandwagon.

I was convinced that I would not fall in love with the series like everyone else did.  I was sure I would find it kind of lame, stupid.

Holy crap, was I wrong!

I LOVED it!!

Here are the books, in order of how much I liked loved them.









I read them all and watched the movies in about a two week time period.

The movies have a different order of loveness...but I guess I can't yet rank them yet since I have not seen the last one.

No worries, I plan on attending a midnight showing of Breaking Dawn part 2 the day it comes out.

I have become completely and utterly obsessed with the series, to the dismay of my husband.

But now that I have finished this series, I need something new to fill the void.

I have found just the thing...



And after that, maybe this...



And hopefully, after that something else great....until I phase into something else entirely.

Community

We spent the weekend living at some one else's house, with them, neighbors and others.  We ate, drank, were merry....and community parented.  It was fantastic.  The question of why we just don't buy a big house and all live and parent together was raised and I honestly can't think of a good reason why we have not already done this.  Yes, there are some people that you know you could never live with but I am pretty sure I would not mind living with any of these people.

On Saturday, after some of us showered and the rest of us pulled on our clothes from the night before, we ventured to the farmers market on the square.  And we immediately regretted it.  It was packed with people and strollers and we became desperate to get the hell away from the crowd.  We ended up going to brunch at Brocach.   Most of the adults indulged in bloody marys with beer chasers while the toddlers ate raisins (Sully hand feeding Sean and Sean totally going along with it), smashed dishes and cried making the dining experience slightly less than enjoyable.

We ended up going home for a nice 3 hour family nap and some showers.  We were back for more fun that evening.  Ava has a talent for occupying toddlers and she doesn't even get bent out of shape when one of them continually sasses her.  Love her.

After the jammies were donned, there was another round of toddler running with non-stop giggles.

In the morning there was composing and Cheerio eating.

After this pic I gave in and used the damn flash.

After Sully forced me to spill coffee all over the couch, I decided we had worn out our welcome and we headed home.

For being a homebody and enjoying alone time, I found myself surprisingly regretful that we had to leave all the fun and energy of a house full of people.  I had the same feeling after coming home from our lake house vacation.  I guess that just reinforces the fact that yes, we do indeed need to buy a big house and live and parent together.