The Great Pumpkin

This is my favorite way to use the Southern Living at Home Barley Twist Pedistal! It was made to show off the Great Pumpkin! Do you have yours? (is that a plug or what? I should have gone with advertising instead of broadcast news!)

Is that Fall
peaking in
my window?

I LOVE this time of year. You know it's fall when you can officially burn leaves. As of Oct. 1, we, the citizens of this fine and very monitored town, can burn leaves! The smell is better than fresh baked apple pie to my nose and senses. It's like the sound of the dryer for me... comfort, warmth, and home. It's crazy that so much beauty can be seen in a time when things are actually dying. Hmmm... food for thought.

Freakishly
Fabulous
Fall Favorite!

This little snack rocks and is so YUMMY and addictive so BEWARE! Take candy corn, add in some salted peanuts, and eat until you pop! Someone brought us this invention last Fall in a little pumpkin dish and I was hooked. It's the salt and the sweet and the crunchey and the soft... it's a FESTIVAL for your mouth! You've been warned...

New Jewels

I am making a new collection to send to St. Simons Island and just wanted to share one of my new favorite pieces (new one every week!). My head has switched over to Fall now and so I am totally embracing the rich deep colors. Please check out georgiajewels.blogspot.com and keep me on your Christmas shopping list!

Ta Da...

Our new fence is up, dogs contained to roam, and the driveway is beautiful. It's so nice, I'm like washing dirt off of it all the time and feeling anxiety over dirty shoe marks on it. Joy... like I needed something else to provide anxiety! Kudoes to my husband who did a beautiful job designing the fence and making one of my desires come true!

Rub-A-Dub-Dub
abby in a tub!

"Hey Mom," (she cracks me up when she calls me "mom" instead of "mommy") "come look at me!" These are the words I hear as I sit in the room next to her bathroom making jewelry. THIS is the adorable site I see when I pull back the shower curtain. Ms. Abby Grace... you are a TRIP!

Mommy's Helper

It blows me away, often, how much my precious one is growing up. She has become my official helper in the kitchen and it has become some of our most rewarding time together each day. She pulls her little stool into the kitchen and her main jobs are making the salad (we eat salad at least 4 times a week) and setting the table. After I cut the lettuce, she washes it, puts it in the spinner and spins it, puts it into the bowl, adds the toppings and takes it t o the table. She then washes the spinner, dries it and puts it back in the cabinet. She also loves to wash corn and stir everything! The joy this brings me is hard to describe... it's pure, sweet, and precious... just like Abby. Nothing she can do is taken for granted... what joy and delight comes in this perspective.

Girls Night IN

Daddy and the boys are off to the Georgia game tonight and so Abby and I are having girls night "in". The chill in the air (yeah!) has inspired tomato soup and grilled cheese for the menu and Abby chose Mary Poppins for our viewing pleasure. She's so stinkin cute. She "ummmed" and "awwwwed" over her dinner and just tickled me with her delight in the evening!

Just a Spoonful of Sugar...

How sad. I am 32 years old and I just have seen Mary Poppins for the first time... well, almost. I have seen bits and pieces numerous times. However, tonight, I missed the part where the children went to the bank... guess I'll scene select and finally see it all!

Team Divo...

This team was on the field next to Abby this past weekend... "Kick it, Kick it good!" I think they must have been going for the attack of distraction!

Camping at Flyrod

Don and I have not been camping since 9-11-01 and have been wanting to take Abby. We thought this might be the year and decided to do a "trial" run in the back yard. Abby was so excited and it was a great time, full of several distinct memories.
The weather was perfect, the stars were bright, and the moon perfectly placed in a break in the trees! Abby was so excited (igsited) about sleeping in the tent, she was ready for bed before dinner. We had brautworst, potato salad, dill pickles, and grapes for dinner. Roasted peanuts for a snack along with a large BAG of marshmellows. Two highlights... Abby falling in our yard, our large yard, and landing directly in a fresh pile of Dusty's latest offering (thankfully we were just steps away from running water and change of clothes!) and peeing in the "woods" (have to be as authentic as possible for true test of camping ability!!!!). She rocked!

"Watch
Your
Marsh-
mellow!"

Abby was all into holding her own stick and roasting her own mellow. She was a pro, she was careful not to put it directly into the flame. However, she often got distracted and that mellow was everywhere. So I finally said, "Abby, watch your marshmellow!" She thought it was the funniest thing in the world and the purest most precious giggle came from her toes. So of course she wanted me to repeat it, over and over... and over and over... and yes, over and over AND over again. It was a "gotta be there moment", but it was one of those pure precious moments you store safely in the depth of your heart for always.

Race for the marshmellow...


I think we have a camper girl.....

On An Inspired Mission

My mom came to visit last week and I am already missing her horribly. She IS Martha Stewart, "Real Simple", "Good Housekeeping", and Rachael Ray rolled into ONE, a Blessed ONE. Sooo... she's gone and I am inspired to get my havoc in better order and have started with the CLOSET in my room. So here it goes, ALL of it, onto the bed, and I am officially weeding out and organizing and getting control of closet madness! I'll keep you posted.

Georgia, I think we have Contact!

Abby usually just wonders around the soccer field, trying to find someone's hand to hold or another game to watch. But this day, Abby actually made contact with the ball and yes, Soccer Mom captured it... as blurrie as it is, we have it captured. I must start taking some muscle relaxers or something before going to the games!

Rubble...

I LOVE yard toys! I must get a Bobcat for Christmas. This thing was and is amazing. It broke up the old driveway like it was made out of crackers. So exciting. Then with the change of an attachment (must be versatile), it scooped it all away in minutes. It knocks over trees, spreads dirt, demos concrete and flips over thousand pound rocks. I have got to get one!!!!! I think being on a demo crew would be great therapy... who needs kick boxing when you can demo something!

Fall Festival Fun

We had our annual Fall Festival and Abby's favorite thing to do is ride the horses. She picked the black horse, Jo Jo. This year she was able to ride it all by herself and she thought she was Big Stuff! Hang on Abby, your four minutes will be over in a flash.

Here's a smile for Grammy and Poppy. Abby and Jo Jo... very sweet horse.

WACKY DOO for you?

There were some very smart girls at the festival. They were twisting girls hair into funny shapes with pipe cleaners and adding curl ribbon and flowers. The line was amazing and Ms. Abby was "So igsited" to get her hair done. It was very cute as she sat there smiling from ear to ear. And of course she picked a green flower, it is her favorite color!

My $7 pony tails!

And here she is, ten minutes... pipe cleaners and fake flowers later... the most expensive (AND cutest) pony tails I have ever seen. It really was a cute idea and we must incorporate it into her fairy costume for Halloween!

That's no wacky doo... that's just Georgia Hair in the back ground!

Part two of "FLY"...

I now realize I am posting these in reverse order (been a while) and so you need to read the entry below this first!

Now, after getting the fly out of the window, Dusty then walks around for a bit with the fly in his mouth... sometimes shaking as it buzzes around in there. Then when ready, he spits out the now "dazed and way confused" fly. As it flips around on the floor, he then pounces on it with is paws and then licks it back up in his mouth and starts again.

Sometimes this delicate game can last for up to thirty minutes... until the lucky contestant stops flipping around on the floor and then he's off to look for the new contestant!

Dusty's New Game... "FLY"

Dusty has found a new past time... torturing flies. With all the yard renos we have going on, the door is open very often and the flies hang out there just waiting for their chance to move in. Many of them like to hang out in the windows and reminise about their prior days of flying free. Dusty has discovered this and pounces on them for step one of his game.
*Notice the fly on the window pane ledge.