What Makes Me Happy

Free coffee!

The Craft Fair

A friend and I are booking a table at the annual Christmas Craft Fair at the mall.  This is my first time doing a craft fair, and it's going pretty good.  Not great, but good. 

I'm making educational toys and activities for kids.  The crayon rolls look sweet, the I Spy bags are nifty, the play-dough kits are innovative, the felt dolls are amusing, and the lace-up cards are laced.  I'd been hoping on a few other ideas, but sadly, they didn't quite work-out. 

I'm a bit confused as to how much stuff I should have.  Like I said, this is a first for me.  I don't want to have too much left over, but I also don't want the table to look bare.  I guess we'll call this a practice run?

Breakfast Enchilada

So, remember when I started The Breakfast Project?  I was going to get really, really, really good at making breakfast, and track my progress on my blog?  Then, I completely ran out of time and kind of forgot about it?  Well, for those of you who were breathlessly waiting for news on The Breakfast Project, this one's for you.

My friend Abi gets the credit for this one.  It starts out with homemade tortillas.  Surprisingly easy, quick and cheap to make!

Yes, I meant for it to be square.  Ahem.

I scrambled some eggs, poured enough of them to thinly cover the frying pan bottom, added shredded cheese, onions and peppers (which I had pre-fried to make them a bit less crunchy).  I slapped a tortilla over it all, and waited for the magic to happen.  Once the egg was cooked, I flipped it through the air and caught it on my plate.  Sadly, I don't have video evidence of that.

I rolled it up like an enchilada.

I put it pretty on a plate with a green salad, added some salsa and ta-da!   Lunch! 

I know, it's The BREAKFAST Project.  So, to make it the real deal, I would have put fruit salad with it.  In this case, though, it was 5 pm, and I wanted greens. 

The kids declared it yummy.

Lick My Floors!

I finally broke down and hired a cleaning lady. I'm not one to pay for something I can do myself, and I don't normally spend money on me but facts are facts. Obviously, I can't do it all myself, and the money is going toward a calmer, healthier, less stressful home for our entire family. Good and good.

So now that I'm done justifying...I LOVE IT!! The bathroom is shining, the floor could be eaten off of (not that Graedon was ever picky), and she even unearthed the book I started a month ago and couldn't find. We now have a standing date for every Thursday morning.

I'm liking this. The only problem is that I've spent the afternoon wandering around not sure what to do with myself. So, I made cheesecake. I am now destined to have a clean house and a thick waistline.

But the floors! Oh, my!

Laugh of the Day

Watching the food network.

Maddie: Mom, what's smoked salmon? Does it smoke cigarettes?

Spooky Halloween Lantern

This post should have been done before Halloween, but I finally got my new camera and couldn't figure out how to get pictures from it to the computer. Better late than never, though, eh?

Here's a quick and easy project for kids. All you need is a mason jar (or any glass jar), tissue paper, white glue, water, a brush, black paper and scissors. First off, mix up the glue with the water to make it runny and less white. Then, brush the mixture onto the jar. Tear off pieces of tissue paper and smooth it over the jar. Once it's wet, it gets a bit fragile, so go carefully.


Then, cut out eyes, a mouth and a nose out of black paper and glue them on. When you've got the jar covered, let it dry a bit and then brush on more mixture to "varnish" it.
Pop in a tea light and ta-da! Jack-o-lantern!


Of course, it helps to have a little munchkin around to supervise.


This is great for Halloween, but how cute would this be in red and green for Christmas?

Graedon

It is November. We've had a few flurries in the last couple weeks. The grass is yellow and dry, the trees are bare. Maddie and I stopped on the side of the road on the way to town to watch a flock of Canadian geese. There must have been a few hundred. With babies so small, I've spent most of my time inside. Cabin fever is already setting in.

It's that time of year when the cold cramps your fingers and you finally give in to making a fire in the furnace...piling the kindling into a little teepee, lighting the match then slamming the furnace door shut and racing upstairs because you forgot to open the switch that feeds air to the fire. Come December I might remember to do that before I go to the basement.

I've been in a major decluttering spree. We've been deciding whether or not to sell the house. After a visit from the realtor and a disappointing look at the comparable homes in our area, we've decided to stay put for the time being. We'll renovate instead. I'm disappointed. I had hoped for a better price on our home, and to be able to buy a little homestead. This house is a good house, but not at all how I envision my dream home. When the market turns around for the better, we'll take a second look.

Who knows what might have happened between now and then?