the great pumpkin post

I posted over at Angela's blog, Frugal Living NW, my big pumpkin post, but I thought I would bring it over here as well.  I know that I have some serious pumpkin lovin' people.




I would put pumpkin in just about everything.  But I draw the line at pumpkin lasagna, which I have made, but pumpkin, in my opinion, is saved for the sweet end of the spectrum.


For the breakfast pumpkin lovers:

::Pumpkin Scones — just like Starbucks.  These are easy to make and taste just like the real thing.

:: Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls — I haven’t tried these, but you bet I will soon.

:: Pumpkin Pancakes

:: Pumpkin Oatmeal — this is a great one for babies.  I fed this to all my kids, with a little less sugar.

Pumpkin desserts:

:: THE Pumpkin Dessert — so delicious!

:: Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bread

:: Pumpkin Cookies

:: Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Squares — very easy

:: Pumpkin Cheesecake — my all time favorite!

Happy Autumn and happy pumpkin baking!

what we're doing

Kinda felt hungover from the Fairy party this week. I think I recovered today.

I'd like to point out that even though I pulled off the fairy party, the rest of the house looked like this behind closed doors. Can't do it all, right?

Just keeping it real

I love this post by Kelle Hampton. So true about the ordinary. BTW - if you are not reading her blog, you should be. Start here and bring a tissue, it's amazing.

I'm making these for dinner tomorrow night. I spend way to much time on Our Best Bites. It just makes me hungry and now that I've been doing the Shred almost every day, I don't really need another reason to be hungry.

We're loving Starfall.

And we're also enjoying Barefoot Books. Super great in the morning to listen to.

It's approaching pumpkin season soon, my favorite and I plan on posting the Great Pumpkin Post. Lots of my favorite recipes to share. I'm already digging them out. If you have some I need to try, comment and let me know.

Garden Fairy Party

I love throwing parties. It's so much fun dreaming about what it will look like, searching the internet to find great ideas, and coming up with a frugal way to pull it all together.

This year Eloise wanted a Rosetta party. Rosetta, a garden fairy, is on Tinkerbell. So we decided on a garden fairy party. She got to invite 5 friends, one of which was her sister.

When I did my first search I found Tom Kat. Oh man, I love this blog and I love that she turned her passion into an amazing business. She had given her daughter a fairy party and I loved all of her ideas. I quickly got to work on tutu's, fairy wands, and wings. All of which came out exactly how I wanted them.

I got my inspiration for the cake from here, scroll down to see the Silvermist cake.

Decorations were great fun too but I couldn't exactly put into words what I wanted so I had to wait until the last minute to work with it. Martha Stewart has a pom pom tutorial that made it easy to whip up these pom poms. They are selling on Etsy too, but I don't have to pay for shipping. I borrow some toile from some friends and flowers from our church. My mom helped with the tablecloth and live flowers and we were ready to go.

She picked out a few items for the food. It was at 3 so we did snacks. Honey Wheat pretzels from Trader Joes (her favorite), pickles, olives, cheese, pixie sticks, pink chocolate over oreo's, sparkle juice, hot dog rolls and strawberry cream cheese star sandwiches.

Our little fairies began to arrive and select their fairy gear.

Aren't they all sweet looking

They ran around and played for a bit and then we began the The Great Fairy Treasure Hunt. Dave and I hid a treasure box with small fairies inside. Then we did 5 clues around the yard. It was fun to watch them running in their tutu's.

I love all those little girls searching for the clue. so cute.

This little guy couldn't decide if he wanted to be in on the action or make a run for it. I think he chose to run. My mom was sure to keep him entertained.

We ended the day with blowing out the candles

opening gifts

laughing and sprinkling pixie dust all over the yard. It was a really fun party and I'm so happy with the way it turned out.

A big thank you to Nana who helped to make this happen. We love you!

First soccer game

We signed Eloise up for her first activity...Soccer!

She loves it. Saturday was her first game and it was hilarious watching the kids (ages 5-7) try and figure out how to navigate this new game. It always cracks me up when the other team scores a goal for them. But it gave her an idea as to how to play the game. Little sister is going to have a tough time waiting patiently during practice and games.

Here's some of my favorite shots.

Lily extremely bored with this activity that has nothing to do with her.
Daddy makes a great bed.

Following soccer we had a fabulous garden Fairy birthday party. I'll post pics of that tomorrow.

savoring the moments

Oh, September, you have arrived. The school buses are traveling and parents are driving to and fro. It's time to start the yearly routine. Lazy summer days have ended and it's time to start back up with the world.

It gets me thinking about how great it is to have one more year of all my kiddos at home. There are times when it drives me insane and I wish for just one moment of peace, but when I stop to think about the fact that they aren't always going to be home, I appreciate the fact that we are still hanging out together.

I've chosen to stay home and not work and with that comes the priviledge of laying around in our sweats, if we want to, watching videos on days where no one feels motivated, and doing preschool lessons with the older two while Sam plays under the table by our feet. It feels great and I am savoring the moments I have before me b/c I know they will pass quickly.

I mean, who wouldn't want to hang out with these three? They're hilarious!