Don't Forget!

This Wednesday is the last day to enter my "Favorite Things" giveaway.

Go HERE to enter - you won't be disappointed, I promise!

Entries are low which means the odds of "YOU" winning are good!

Ornament Exchange

Halloween is tomorrow which means that Thanksgiving and Christmas are right around the corner.  I thought it would be neat to do an ornament exchange but I found something better than that.  Carrie from All That Is Sweet In Life has already organized one which means that I can just participate and not have to organize.

The deadline is November 1st, so if you want to participate, go HERE.

Pumpkin Marshmallows

These have to be the cutest things I have made in a long time

A big thanks to Betty Crocker Wannabe!

{Tee Hee...}

I just can't get over how stinkin' adorable they are!

Unfortunately I didn't have as much yellow food coloring as I thought I did so half of the batch is a little more red than I would have liked.

I'm thinking that James' friends won't mind one though.

I also decided to use pretzel sticks for the stems instead of Popsicle sticks.

First of all pretzel sticks are a heck of a lot cheaper AND now the entire thing is edible.

I for one won't be eating any though.

I LOVE me some sugar but I seriously don't think I could even stomach all that sweetness.

Tomorrow I am going to go through my ribbon and find some green to tie on the top.

I just had to show you now -- I was so excited about how cute they turned out!

Pumpkin Carving!

It's that time of year..for almost everyone.

This was old hat to Alysia and James.

Parker on the other hand, this was all new to him.

He loved it!

Without further ado...

Randomness

I have a pretty uneventful weekend but it seemed to be full of "stuff".  I know that doesn't make any sense but you know, that's how it is sometimes.

-- First off, I have been getting my migraines again and let me just tell you that sucks!  There's no nice way to put that.  Every night around the same time I get them and they just kill me.  I have meds but I hate the side affects so I put it off until I can't stand the migraine anymore.  It's just all around not good.  I can't really function although I try.  My kids hate it -- I'm just darn right grouchy.  Brian swears that the headaches are from lack of sleep.  Could be possible?!  Who knows.  All I know is that I am getting tired of getting them every day and I'm going to have to make another trip to the doc so they can change my meds of something.

-- Friday night Alysia was at the high school football game, Dad was at work, Parker went to bed and I got to spend the evening with James.  I "needed" to work but was soooo tired I didn't.  I even had plans to go to a friends house and I passed that up too.  James and I snuggled on the couch and watched Pirates of the Caribbean.  I fell asleep on the couch at 9:30 and when Alysia got home around 11:00 I went to bed.  It was a much needed night of rest! {even though I did stand my friends up} 

-- Saturday my friends tried to attempt another get together and they weren't going to let me get away with passing this one.  I conceded just because I'm such a loner and I have to say that it was a GREAT night.  We have spaghetti night at my house and played WII.  It was a night that didn't end until 2:00 which wasn't good for me trying catching up on my sleep the night before.  But all in all, it was worth it.

Angie and Beth trying out some archery!  I'm not bragging {okay, maybe I am}, but I'm the bomb at this!  So was Beth.  We should have competed against each other, but we didn't.  Don't know why...

The two cutest kids on the face of the earth!  Admit it :)

My beautiful baby girl!

My handsome fella {by the way, I MADE him shave TODAY}.  All that hair on his face -- YUCK!  Love my man clean shaven.  In his defense he has been working his butt off and has not been able to spend anytime at home.  I was thankful he was able to be at home last night with us! 

In case you forgot what the cutest kids look like!

Chet and Angie getting into the Sword fighting!

Mr. Man showing his dance moves..he soooooo does not get into it like me and yet he still gets AWESOME points.  Really chaps my hide!

Alysia and Jennifer dancing!  Let me just tell you, Just Dance will kick your butt if you do more than two songs.

--  Today we went and visited my momma!  She had her hip replacement surgery about a week and a half ago and it is so good to see her in good spirits.  She was supposed to be on the walker for four weeks but she is already on her cane.  I never realized how much she sounded "down" before the surgery but seeing her in good spirits and not in pain makes me realize what she was really going through.  I am so glad that she is almost back to where she wanted to be.

You got have a cool sunglasses when eating dinner...right?!

-- Now I'm off to work :(  I had every intention of working last night since I didn't Friday night but my friends "made" me hang out with them so that didn't happen.  {It really was nice to do though}.  But now I am paying for it tonight and will be up all night in order to meet my deadline in the morning.  If I miss it my whole week will be screwed and I'll miss all kinds of deadlines.  Not good...it's 9:00 and I have about 5 hours worth of work ahead of me.

With that being said...I'm going to work.  With coffee in hand....

OHHHH....go enter my giveaway!  When you see the box of goodies you'll be disappointed if you didn't!!  Click the link at the top of the page!

Pumpkin Spice Cookies

I am not a huge fan of pumpkin pies and having already made three of them so far this season I wanted to do something different with pumpkin.  I searched the internet for a cookie recipe and found one but "tweaked" it to work for me.  It's simple and easy.  I doubled the batch but one will yield about 2 dozen cookies.

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup butter, softened
1 cup white sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 cup canned pumpkin pie filling
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

{If you only have pumpkin and not the pie filling kind you add 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon, 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg, and 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves}

1.Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt; set aside.

2.In a medium bowl, cream together the 1/2 cup of butter and white sugar. Add pumpkin, egg, and 1 teaspoon vanilla to butter mixture, and beat until creamy. Mix in dry ingredients. Drop on cookie sheet by tablespoonfuls; flatten slightly.

3.Bake for 15 to 20 minutes in the preheated oven. Cool cookies, then drizzle glaze with fork.

4.To Make Glaze: Combine confectioners' sugar, milk, 1 tablespoon melted butter, and 1 teaspoon vanilla. Add milk as needed, to achieve drizzling consistency.


THEY ARE YUMMY and THEY MAKE YOUR HOUSE SMELL YUMMY!!

It Never Stops

The awesomeness that you find online, that is!  Look at these awesome projects shared over on my Tumblr account.  Don't forget to check it often for new things, ALL THE TIME!

First off you have to go check out my friend's blog, The Sweet Life .  Alisa used to the the craft coordinator at MOPS when I went and we made these a couple years ago.  Toilet paper pumpkins -- CUTE -- {and reusable}.



These Placemat Leaf Pillows are sooooo cute.  I'm a Little disappointed though because when I went to Wal-mart I couldn't find the placemats.  Now that I think of it though, they were probably in the seasonal.  Silly me looked where all of the other kitchen stuff is.  I'm going to have to check it out the next time I go.  Leave some for me if you grab yourself a few. PLEASE!



These Conversation Coasters would make a cheap, CUTE Christmas gift, don't you think?!  Go check it out and follow her tutorial on how to make them.



Crazy Delicious Food has the cutest Chocolate Tree Cupcakes!.  They are so easy to make and look like only a professional could do it!



I'm thinking this crockpot style Baked Potato Soup is going to be a staple in my family!  We can't pass up a good baked potato soup recipe!



What'd I tell you?!?!  Now you can see why I can never get anything done around the house!  There is so much stuff to look at when I get on the computer!

Happy Surfing!

Blog Anniversary GIVEAWAY!

How in the WORLD did I let my one year blog anniversary slip my mind?!?

September 22 would have marked my one year.  Let me remind you though, that I was preparing for a wedding.

So all things bloggy related took the back burner for a couple weeks.

I think I may have lost a follower or two in my absence but since then I have made some new friends!

Whether it's because I twist your arm or because you are actually interested in what I write, I want to thank all of you that visit me.

You never know what I am going to post about.

Sometimes, I don't even know what I'm going to post.

Over the next year I have some awesome "thoughts" that I want to implement so I hope you will continue to follow along with me.

In honor of my anniversary I am doing a giveaway called "My Favorite Things."

I'm going to be putting a small package together that includes some of my favorite things and one of you lucky readers will get to receive all the goodness!

I'm not telling what the favorite things are yet but I can promise you it will be really good!

Some sweets, some crafty things, lots of "stuff".

You won't want to miss it.

The giveaway will be open for two weeks so on November 3rd.

On that day I will electronically draw a winner and ship all of the goodies your way!

To enter, please leave a comment below.

Go ahead....tell me how much you love me!!

I'm not to proud to beg!

For another entry, give me some suggestions of what you would like to see/read on here.

Good Luck!!

Dresses, High Heels, Pearls, Vacuuming?

Barbara Billingsley, also known as June Cleaver who was the quintessential mom on "Leave It To Beaver", died yesterday at the age of 94.

It saddens me to hear that an icon such as her has passed.  Her children described her as the exact same as the role that she played on the sitcom.  To me it seems that she lived a very happy and fulfilling life.

I have secretly wanted to be June Cleaver {who hasn't}.  She had it all together.  A mild-mannered, perfectly coiffed housewife who typically wore dresses, high heels and a strand of white pearls even while vacuuming or baking cookies for her boys.  Who wouldn't want to come home to that?

Behind all of that though we must not forget that it is TV.  Why did she wear heels on the show?  In the beginning, she actually wore flats.  Then as the boys grew taller she switched to heels.  The scenes of her standing on the stairs?  The producers wanted her to remain taller than the boys.  There is even a secret behind the pearl necklace.  {Yes, there is more to it than what my hubby says.} 

My prayers are with her family and son's that she left behind.  May she always be remembered...  

Photo Challenge by Paper Mama

How fitting that the photo challenge by Paper Mama this week is "FALL".  Even though they are repeats here are my entries!

Head over and check out all the awesome entries!

Our Little Photo Shoot

I loaded the kids up in the car today and took them out to do a photo shoot.  I wanted to capture some of the autumn scenery at it's best.  Unfortunately, there were a lot of trees that had already lost their leaves which surprises me.

Alysia was ready to go.

James was as ready as he was going to be.

Parker...not so much.

I took along a chair, two pumpkins and a wagon for props.  Parker had more fun with the pumpkins and the wagon so we decided to ditch those and move to another location.  At one point the pumpkins were rolling down the hill and Alysia and James were running to get them and Parker was crying hysterically because he couldn't get to them.  I was laughing so hard I couldn't get a pic!

Here are some of my favs from the day.

This is one of the {very} few that I got Parker smiling.

 This is my beauty!!

Alysia and James got along very well without any prodding from me!

That is a rarity!

 Parker would NOT look at the camera unless I told him there was a "bug" on the lens...then he wanted to touch it!

 This is one of my favs of Alysia!

 Adorable...I couldn't get him to smile at me so he was laughing at his sister!

 Where is that DARN BUG???

 This tree was B E A U T I F U L!!  There was every color imaginable on it!!