Autumn

Sprinklings: A new tradition

| mollyeleen

Did you miss me yesterday? I hope so and yes I failed my challenge of 31 days of blogging, but it was all for a good reason.  The reason- Kiddo.  She looked at me last night and said “ah do you have to blog? I want to just snuggle.” Done deal.

bishops3Today we went to our favorite pumpkin patch- Bishops Pumpkin Farm. It’s one of those places that is magical and full of autumn fun. We met up with some wonderful friends along with hundreds of others who thought today was a great day to go to the pumpkin patch. And you know, even though it was crowded, it was a wonderful day.

bishops2Kiddo got to ride a pony “Johnny” and she was smitten. She loved all five minutes of the ride. It was wonderful to see, last year she needed us to walk next to her. (Oh she is growing up so fast!)

bishops-junkWe even scarified our tummies for some junk food. We are paying for it now of course. It’s not fun when our vegan tummies experience normal junk food. Was it worth it? For the memories yes!

bishops_flowersI think my favorite part of the farm is the sunflower labyrinth. It’s a calm spot of the day and you can pick sunflowers along the way.

We are happy to be home and out of the hot sun. One day it will cool off here, I am so ready for the cold weather! signature

sprinklingPart of a 31 day challenge- Sprinklings of my reality

Sprinklings: pumpkin love

| mollyeleen

I do not really know why, but I love going to the pumpkin patch. Every year I look forward to the day; the crisp air, the colors of the pumpkins against the green leaves and mud. It all makes me happy.

pumpkin2CollageToday we met some friends at one of the local patches. The air wasn’t crisp at all- it was pretty stinkin’ warm. It was a beautiful day. How funny is it that Kiddo is posing in the friends pic… classic kiddo. She wants to be on stage or tv.  She actually cries about it once a week: “why am I not on stage yet? it’s just not fair!” It does throw us for a loop, not sure what we are going to do about it. Hopefully she will fall in love with Shakespeare and not pole dancing. (I only say this because Kiddo loves to dance on tables with the spot lights (flashlights) shinning on her. Oye!

pumpkinCollageOf course there is a barn here with adorable baby animals. I love the baby goats, they where so cute. Kiddo, of course, wanted to pet the chickens…my worst petting animal nightmare. I let her though, I stayed outside of the chicken stall…can’t handle it. Lots of hand sanitizer later…it was all good.

I know we will be visiting at least once more before Halloween.  It was a great way to spend a few hours with my girls and friends. signature

sprinklingSprinklings of my reality is a 31 day series challenge. Read them all…

Sprinklings: Short and super sweet

| mollyeleen

So I don’t have a sweet tooth, unless candy corn is involved.  Not sure why but I love those little triangles. Could be the colors,  white, orange & yellow- When I was younger I would eat off the white then the orange and pop in the yellow- don’t have time for that anymore.  Could be the slight honey sweetness, I don’t know, they are perfect to me.

And then my friend Alison introduced me to something a little more perfect.

detourOkay- I’m taking you on a detour because this is my world.  Bedtime for kiddo was two hours ago.  She has never been a good sleeper and we struggle getting her to sleep; I think the book “go the *uck to sleep” was written for us- seriously if you have kids you should, no need, to read this book.  So I am multi-tasking writing my post and nursing sneaky b and kiddo comes out of her room, walks up to me, rubs her wet finger across my cheek and says

“mommy do you feel that?

“Yes why is your finger wet?” (I’m thinking she was playing in the fish-tank)

“The wet is from the tears coming from my eyes. I’m upset”

Taking a deep breath…”why?”

“Because a few weeks ago you through away a band aid that I wanted to keep”

“Go. To. Bed. Now.”

Where does she come up with this stuff?  She is my little hippy that is for sure. She wants to keep everything and make something new, but a used band-aid? NO, I draw the line there.

Okay- back to where we were…

candy cornMy friend Alison introduced me to mixing candy corn and dry roasted peanuts!!  Salty and sweet all in one handful. OMG!  Candy corn even more perfect! LOVE IT!

Happily, for my already wideness, I only buy candy corn in October, kind of like Starbucks pumpkin latte. You wait for it, probably have a bit too much of it, then wait another eleven months for it.

This fantasticalness might not be new to you, but it sure was to me. Do you have a salty sweet treat you enjoy? I would love to hear about it signature

sprinklingSprinklings of my reality: day 9

Autumn is in the air…FINALLY

| mollyeleen

We are so fortunate to live in California, the weather has been amazing lately.  Annoyingly so.  Don’t get me wrong, warm sunny days are fantastic, but when it’s November I don’t want 83 degrees.  I want jeans, sweaters, boots! Today it was chilly, windy and raining, awesome.  Our afternoon was spent inside (shocking I had to sew) kiddo watching a movie, munching real popcorn (aka not microwaved) and my need to add a bit of Autumn decorations.

As you know, we glittered acorns the other day and Kiddo made these awesome leaves at pre-school.  “Mommy, we need to display my leaves in my gallery.” Of course they needed to be displayed, but how?  Think, think, think… taking down the last of the Halloween decorations this evening, I figured it out!  I have a large simple black frame that had a spider web in it, and I thought there has to be a way to hang the leaves in the frame.

Thread and tape! A little tape to hold the thread on the back of the frame, a bit of tape to hold leaf in place; how easy is that! It took about 5 minutes and looks perfect! I am sure there are many “better” ways to do this, but it got the job done and if I didn’t tell you how I did it, I don’t think you would guess thread and tape- would you?

Pretty leaves, glitter acorns, an awesome turkey painting by kiddo (his head the small green blob on the left) and a piece of vintage orange and blue paper framed (thank you Ashley for mentioning that you did this today) brilliant!  Now for a cup of tea and my evening work basket.

Glittered Acorns, oh my

| mollyeleen

In the park behind our home is a massive oak tree that has the most awesome acorns.  I collect them every year for the table during November.  This year I thought how about adding some sparkle (aka glitter).  For some reason I thought today would be a good thing to do it, probably because I was done cutting (I cut out 4 more jackets and 15 superhero capes), the kiddo has been acting weird all day (super quite and wanted to wear pajamas, if you know my kiddo you know this is weird!) Kiddo also wanted to do a project with Mommy and I want to get the Halloween decorations down and Thanksgiving decorations up. So why not, let’s get our glitter on, shall we?

Bowl of almost awesome acorns

This is super simple to do, takes about an hour, is messy, fun and somewhat annoying when you realize that this was the wrong day to include the kiddo, but hey the glitter almost matches the carpet!

Here is what I used, thrifted vintage glitter in a coppery-gold color, white glue watered down a bit, paint brush, small plastic container and acorns.

Add some of your glitter into the small container, this is to “help” contain the glitter and “help” little hands keep it somewhat contained.

Brush your acorn with the glue mixture.  I started off glittering the seed part, but after a few where done, I switched to glittering the caps, I like them much better.

Place the painted seed into the container of glitter and let the kiddo “gently” roll it around to get glitterized. This is where my “containment” plan failed, I think the container I used was a bit to small, one wobble and it was all over the floor.  I needed to vacuum anyway.

A bit of glue in the cap to stick it back in place, and it’s purrdy.  Kiddo and I decided to try glittering the cap of the next acorn and after that she said “Okay Mommy, you can continue doing this, I am going to go to London now to visit with the mermaids.” (okay three and half year old, whatever- quite crafting moment for me).

 About a half hour later I had finished. Aren’t they cute with the glittered cap?  I did end up brushing the seed part with the watered down glue too, it adds a little shine and protects them a bit.

Now I have a bowl of awesome glitterized acorns.  Have you ever glittered acorns?  Are you going to try it?  Maybe pinecones for December?  (Now I need to vacuum)