In my blog I plan to chat about nature, crafts, baking, gardening, beekeeping, family, and whatever else seems appropriate at the time. Sit back, relax, and enjoy!

Tuesday, October 23, 2018

Fall Fun

My Shug has been off of work the last couple of weeks due to foot surgery.  So, we have been taking our cart (Kubota) over to the pond and taking breaks in the sun and enjoying watching the fish jump in the water. 

I took these pictures last week and the trees had not started turning very much yet.

You can see in this picture, they turned just a little.

On Thursday of last week, John and Elizabeth (below) and my cousin Vickie and her husband Robert, came to town and we went out for tenderloins!  John is Robert's brother and they (J&E) are from Maine  Apparently tenderloins are an Indiana thing.  I didn't know that until a few years ago.  And Ray's Drive-In, in Kokomo, Indiana, have some of the best!  They were pretty surprised to see the size of them!  There were leftovers!

Thursday evening my sis and her family came up, Mom and Dad and Vinh came over too, and we watched a scary movie outside on the patio.  Remember, the patio in the last post.  I never got to use it this summer because if it wasn't way too hot, we were infested with mosquitoes.  Well, our temperatures went from 85 to 45 in one week.  I'M NOT KIDDING!
My Shug built a big fire and my sister set up the movie screen while I made chili and hot dogs in sauce.

As the sun started setting we made our way to the patio.
We had blankets to wrap up in and with the fire, it was nice and cozy down there. The warm apple cider and rum helped too! And as you could tell by the picture above, showing the whole patio, you can see it has retaining walls around it so it's protected from the wind.


On Saturday my Shug and I went to an orchard.


I hear white pumpkins are the thing this year, to go with all of the "farmhouse style" décor.





And on the way to and from the orchard we went to a couple of garage sales!
I have quite a collection of these brown bag cookie molds.  Anytime I can pick them up for $1.00, I do!  A witch and a Christmas stocking!
I'm visualizing this with some vases in it holding herbs next spring.  $2

This was drawer liner paper and I didn't notice the scent on it until I got home.  Ugh...I'm not one for scented stuff like this.  I bought it to use for junk journaling.  That was also the reason I bought the Little Golden Books.  If you don't know what I'm talking about check out Pinterest or You Tube on making junk (or travel) journals out of Little Golden Books.  (Or any book)  I purchased one a few weeks ago and did a lot of junking to it!  It's really fun!

I bought this lamp shade for a lamp we have that needs one.  It's an old lamp and I can't seem to find a shade that looks good for it.   And this Betty Crocker cookbook....Not sure if I will keep it.  I have a newer version.
Now, if you remember (I'm sure you do! lol!) last year I changed up my fall decoration colors.
And I found the perfect table cloth at one of the sales we stopped at.
I also bought this table cloth.  I like the colors but I also like the way it felt....the material.  I thought if I didn't use it for a table cloth I might make something out of it.  Don't know what!

At the orchard we bought some apples, an apple gourd,
and some hulless popcorn.  Never heard tell but I thought I'd give it a try.
One last fun fall thing...felting.  I've been wanting to do this little project for years but never got around to it.  I've been needle felting little acorns.


 BOO!

Happy Fall Y'all!

Cindy

Thursday, October 18, 2018

The patio...and plants!

A few weeks ago my Shug and I went to Wal-Mart. 
Bad idea to drop me off by the plants.  Those of you who know me, know that I am probably the only person that has walked out of Wal-Mart with nothing purchased, several times!  But this time, they had these beautiful, colorful, succulents.

And I knew winter was coming, and I would need color!
(I should have bought a bunch of them!)


But I only bought one.  The color is fading a bit.  I have to wonder if they added coloring somehow...like they do to those poor little Easter chicks in the springtime.
After sitting on the windowsill for a few weeks, I decided maybe it needed a bigger pot.



 This was the pot it came in.
 Then I went to the grocery store and THIS succulent, which is pretty big was only $3.49!  It even has a couple of babies in the pot!

 This summer I worked really hard to make our patio area look nice.   It's the first time I've had the time to mess with it since we moved upstairs.

 I put up the little white fencing.




 My Shug bought me this planter for the patio as a love gift!  It filled out really nice by June/July.




 These pots were birthday gifts from my parents a couple of years ago.

 A lot of the plants in these pictures were in their infancy stage.
 I used this dead tree to plant annual vining seeds that grew up the tree.  And in the long planters were elephant ear bulbs, that did not do well (too shallow I think) and sweet potato vine, that did really well.
I think we used the patio one time this summer.  It was way too hot outside and the mosquitoes were ruthless.  When we would step outside they would start swarming us!

 Today started out around 39F!  Brrrrr....All of those pretty outside plants have been brought inside for the winter.
 So this one room in the basement is full of plants.  It's kind of fun, I think!




 Tonight....it's going to be 42degrees outside....and we're using the patio (sigh)

Cindy