Yeah for cooler weather and fall activities!

I am not a summer person, nor a hot weather person, so when the weatherman predicted rain and cooler temps I cried.  It's been a long hot summer and I was more than ready for it to vamoose.  I love the rain, and fall, and cool weather.  I love the activities we do in the fall and through the spring.  

 Things like read books!  A friend from ravelry sent us this book.  I think we've read it 10 times.  What a fun book!  The art work is amazing too.

 Football!  Oh my, I love football season.  I more listen than watch since I'm churning out the knitting but I love football.  Our grandsons are playing flag football this season and we are loving the games.

 We return to library story time every Wednesday and come home with a big bag of books to read the following week.

 I've been getting a bit more knitting done.   Due in the part to the aforementioned football, but also due to the 2 hour nap time I have free while the littlest sleeps before I pick up the school kids.  I'm in the Advent swap again in the Itty Bitty group and one of the requirements to include was the nesting boxes from Itty Bitty Toys.  These took longer than I anticipated so I was glad I started them first.  Shega even helped with knitting one of them.  They were labor intensive but I loved the results.  It will be hard to send them away.  I think I'd do a few modifications if I were to do them again.

 There was also a fall swap in the itty bitty group that I joined.  One of the swapees shared her craft on the forum and I knew it would be fun to do with the kids.  She sent me some pointers when I asked about it.  Pumpkins from canning jar rings.  I wish I could come up with these creative ideas but I'm glad somebody does and then shares so the rest of us non creative types can copy.

 Step one was laying out the rings and painting the insides with spray paint.

 While waiting overnight from them to dry, we also did another craft I'd found on pininterest a year ago.  We even went leaf hunting and pressed the leaves.  They've been sitting in the garage for a year.  Using modge podge you paint the leaves on a canning jar and they use it as a candle holder.  They kids had fun with this too and although I don't have the finished project with a candle in it, it really does look wonderful with the light shining through the leaves. Lighter brown leaves work better than the dark red.

 After the rings were dry it was time to tie 12 of them together

 and form a pumpkin shape.

 Spray paint a glossy orange and we used a metallic copper to accent.

 Sprinkle glitter on the wet paint.

 In their minds there is no "too much" glitter.

 Success!  Can't wait for them to dry and put on the table with our candle holders.

Happy Fall...already?

I've been told the first rule of blogging is not to apologize for absences.  So I won't.  I've noticed when I step away from the blog is when I'm emotionally in a bit of a tailspin or life is crazy busy or I'm tired of being on the computer.  This absence has all three qualifiers.  The downward emotional tailspin was caused by watching a few more pieces of my heart go to school each day.  Sure I still have 2 here but 7 are not.  I've been scrapbooking online 8 albums from our Disney trip as well as keeping up 8 day to day albums for 8 grandmunchkins.  Hence the overload on computer time.  The Disney albums are done and the 8 day to day albums are pretty much caught up and require a half hour a day or so to get pictures and comments in per event per album.  I am, however, now doing our church bulletin weekly and some weeks are a bit more work than others.  As for the crazy life.  Well, the pictures below explain that.  While I won't apologize for my absence, I'll apologize for the photo overload.  There are knitting projects, birthdays, fall activities, and life that happened over the last 2 and a half months.                          

 A few of my finished knitting projects.  They are on ravelry if you would like more details.

 While I knit and care for the home, my husband fishes.  Successfully!
And below are the pieces of my heart I'm lending to the schools each day.  I'm thankful their parents let me have them each day.  While I wish they were with their parents and lent to me, in this world that's not possible so I will hold out my hands and be thankful for each moment they are here.

There were 2 special birthdays.  Our sweet daughter and Great Grammie.

 A trip to the pumpkin patch was in order as the air cooled and the leaves changed.

 And on Halloween we were visited by a Princess, Tigger, 2 Ironmen, Steve, a Nerd, a Care Bear, and a witch.  Did I forget anyone?

 Happy Fall!  "A second spring where every leaf is a flower".

 Raking and gathering commences.  We have an art project in mind for those leaves.  Stay tuned.

A quick glimpse of the last few months.  I'll try not to stay away so long.

Well what do you know? Something got done!

All hands on deck!  The leaves are down!  Bring out the rakes, bring out the wheelbarrow, the coats, the hats, the boots!  Graypa is home and those leaves are going to get raked up and picked up!

                                                        Enough rakes for almost all!

 And when the work is done, there's a wonderful leaf pile calling their names.  Leaves to throw.....

                                        leaves to lay in..............

                                         leaves for a photo op.

             The work is done and the reward is getting to skip naps and watch Disney's Tarzan.  A movie, no matter how good, is just better with kids laughter.  Make that a kids' movie.

 Even the littlest pumpkin had to work.  His work is called "tummy time" and he's not always smiling!

 And can you believe it...there are some knitting and crocheting projects in the FO pile!

 My youngest daughter and I took a class at our LYS in crocheting necklaces.  A two hour class and we had new necklaces for church the next day.  They are made of beads (size 6/0) and rayon thread normally used in counted cross stitch or embroidery.  But the instructor also had samples of other yarns that might be in our stash and useable for necklaces.  Making more?  Why yes I am!  The next will take longer because I'll actually have to string the beads.  The instructor did that for us for class.

 And a sweater is off the needles and on a little girl.  This was a test knit for Dakine Knits called "something whimsical".  It was fun to knit and fairly fast.  I added a bit in the back to made sure it closed up.  Details on my ravelry page.  I used "Rapunzel" buttons and "sparkle" yarn per request of the princess.  She was pretty excited to see her "Tangled" sweater.

A couple more projects on the needles that should find their way on to this blog soon since my Christmas shopping is DONE...don't shoot me.  Simple this year.  Shopping done via a phone call and a few emails and some online time.