I love a rainy day...

I do love a rainy day once in a while, and it is a pretty nasty windy rainy one here today. I feel like it gives me permission to change things up a bit in the routine. When little one asked me what we were going to do today I told her we would be staying home all day and that she could play with all her toys and watch some of her favorite tv shows. She was thrilled at that plan.

Anyway, I decided I would spend the day doing some crafty things. I worked on some more clipboards and then wallpapered my refrigerator, yup, that wasn't a typo, I did.

I have been so sick of the mess on it all the time. Little one doesn't play with these things enough anymore to justify this eye sore.

I found a roll of really vintage rose wallpaper at the thrift store last week for seventy-five cents.
I imagine I will get tired of it at some point-and at that point I will figure out how to remove it, but for now I really love it!

Now we are off to go make those cookies I promised her.

Yes, rainy days can be fun!

she amazes me...

My two daughters, ages 4 and 16 share a room. Yes, I know you are wondering how can that possibly work?! Well, I don't really know, we just make it work-at least most of the time. My biggest issue is the fact that dd16 is just a tad unorganized, ahem, to say the least. But what are you going to do...?

Anyway, last night the little one had a last minute sleepover at Grandma's who lives down the block with her favorite cousin/bestest friend who is also 4. So that meant dd16 didn't have to vacate her room at 7pm for little sister's bedtime, only to return when she was fast asleep.

So she was able to draw and listen to music and do what she does without interruption.

This is what I found when I went in there after she had gone to school this morning.

It's her name in sign language...I think it's pretty cool.

I mentioned quite some time ago she is hearing impaired as well as her older brother, his hearing is definitely worse. They wore hearing aids up until a couple of years ago and then decided not to, which I was OK with. There is no question that my son will require wearing them again probably before college.

Anyway, when I saw this, I guess it brought back memories...of hearing aids, audiologists, speech and hearing therapy, going to special school at waaaay too early of an age.

A trip down memory lane...

God is good... all is well.

crafting and cooking...

I had so much fun making these clipboards! I first saw them a good while back over at the very talented Jane's Apron, where she makes lots of them and they are just beautiful! Over the summer she was kind enough to make a tutorial and I finally got to making some.

I have some other little decoupage projects in mind...

Here are the last of the peppers. I think we wouldn't appreciate wonderful fresh vegetables if we had them all year long. At least I know I wouldn't-not as much anyway.

Here are some stuffed peppers ready for the oven and off to a friend.

I can't believe how cold it has been at night. It went down to 28 degrees last night-brrr...

No wonder I was so cold this morning, the heat wasn't on! I 'm a hold out as far as putting the heat on too early, you know that thrifty thing again. But that was just a little too cold. So we put it on for a little while this morning so we wouldn't freeze to death.

Hope you are having a great day!

I have two words for you...

Yum Yum!

Just tried this Recipe for Pumpkin Spice Latte from Mary Ellen's blog.

It's not Starbucks, but a good runner up, and a lot cheaper!

still going...

The garden that is. We still have some leeks, peppers, cauliflower and this late crop of lettuce. There is romaine, butter, red and green leaf lettuces.

I just made a nice ceasar salad for lunch, the romaine was delicious.

I have made a couple of batches of Potato Leek soup over the last couple of weeks and some vegetarian chile to use up lots of those peppers. I have a couple of more tomatoes left, I've been wanting to try some cream of tomato soup.

I'm getting hungry just typing this, I better stop.

Hope you are having a great day!

mmm...

This morning I went to my Amish friend's nearby farm and made homemade potato chips. I took a bushel of our home grown potatoes (about 20 lbs.) and came home with the most delicious chips any of us have ever had.

I wish I had pictures to share, but could you imagine me asking if I could take pictures for my blog? First of all, they wouldn't even know what a blog is and then once I explained it I'm sure the next question would be "why do you do that?? Honestly, I don't think I could think of answer that would make any sense to her.

It is against their religion to have"graven images" of themselves. I would have just taken pictures of the process of course, but I thought I better not ask, I want to be invited back again, this is the fourth year I have gone and it is such a treat to be included.

They enlist the help of many family members. Grandmother's on both sides, mother, sisters, daughters, sons in-law, it is quite an event. Everything is set up outside, there are individuals that are designated slicers, cookers, seasoners, baggers and the keeper of the flames. Two very large wood heated homemade kettles are set up and the process goes quite fast. I think I was there about 45 minutes total to do my 2o lbs.

Each year that I have had the opportunity to take part in this, I just can't get over the efficiency, joy and thriftiness I observe in these folks.

Many people may call the Amish "backward" or out of touch.

I love what I see in them! I see a strong sense of community, people who are walking in love and faith, not to mention a work ethic that is so rare and so impressive and lacking in our society.

I think we have an awful lot to learn from them....indeed.

autumn fun...

We woke up to a perfect crispy cool autumn day. So we decided to go out for a drive.

We even took Molly, our dog. uh oh, where's the little one??

oh, there she is under Molly, where she remained for a good part of our drive.

You can still get a bargain sometimes...


not too much traffic today...

We even had entertainment over at Kitchen Kettle Village. This is a very quaint little tourist spot in the town of Intercourse (yes, I know, it's a peculiar name).
Mmmm...lemon curd.
and a nice warm pretzel twist.
Not bad for a Thursday morning!

the fair...

Well, hubby did it again. He won 14 ribbons at our local township fair last week, it wasn't for lack of competition either. We all get a chuckle out of Dad preparing for this thing. He has truly turned into a sport.

These are all the different categories he won in. Some of these things may look slightly droopy because this picture is obviously post-fair.

I entered this pillow and won first place. The funny thing is I didn't know I won until it was all over and I picked it up and saw the ribbon on it. I don't know if the ribbon fell behind it when it was on display, but it was a nice surprise.

We spent lots of time at the fair. It's a great place to run into friends and nieghbors. A real country fair atmosphere...fun, fun, fun!