Happy Halloween - Trick or Treat??

Our little ladybug came trick-or-treating to our house tonight. She was so adorable, this is the first year that she actually liked dressing up. The last few years she didn't want anything to do with dressing up or trick-or-treating. She takes after Uncle Adam.... except he never liked it. His favorite Halloween was to go to Gayley-bird's house and help her hand out the candy. One year he dressed up and sat in a chair with the candy bowl in his lap like he was stuffed and then when the little kids would grab out their candy he would jump up and scare them.... he liked that part and so did Gayle.

Of course Grandma had to spoil Elly and since she was the only treater we got tonight she gets the whole bowl of treats!!

Now next year she'll have to share with the other two little ones that will join this family..... yes you heard me.... two!! First will be Shannon's November Baby that will join us any day now and then Lynn and Jesse are expecting their first baby in June!

TRICK OR TREAT???

TREAT!!

Or should we say "Blueberry"??

Here's the story for that comment.... Shortly after we found out about Lynn expecting Elly, Shannon and I were driving to meet Lynn. Elly was looking at a baby book that Shan was giving to her. Elly asked what Tia's (Lynn's) baby looked like, so Shan found the picture of the stage the baby was at. Elly and I had a conversation that I will never forget

Grandma - "Elly, what can you see on the baby"

Elly - "Cheeks, Eyes, Head, Legs, Arms, Chin and a Nose"

Grandma - " You can see all of that?"

Elly - "Yeap"

Grandma - "Wow"

Elly - "Grandma, how big is Tia's baby"

Grandma - "Hummmm I don't know"

Shannon - "Elly give me the book and I'll find out how big it is"

Shannon - "It's as big as a blueberry"

Elly - "A BLUEBERRY"

Grandma - "Elly do you know how big a blueberry is?"

Elly - "Yes, but I didn't know a blueberry could have cheeks and a chin?"

So when we finally got by Tia, Elly runs over to her, jumps up in her arms and says "Tia your having a blueberry".

Winter Pick up

So today is much nicer outside so I moved my cleaning craze outdoors. I cleaned the patio and the garage porch. I hauled tons of stuff to my garden shed, the walls in that shed are starting to push outward. I don't like the empty look for either of these spaces but John thinks they should look like this all year.

I had a few plants that were still living so I couldn't throw them away quite yet, so I made a front door arrangement, we'll see how long Mr Winter lets me keep it.

And of course I have to show you the garage porch... you don't have to like it, I certainly don't. I filled my Grandmothers wagon with pumpkins and a living plant yet just to keep something up for fall. John has to put away the patio heater and the inside of the garages have to be cleaned to make room for the bench. That bench is from when we bought this house it was left on the front porch, that was 26 years ago. My mom always said to me every time she came over.... "when you throw that bench away let me know I'll take it". She knew I was a thrower of everything so she was thinking she would have it a year after we moved it. It certainly needs tender loving care but it's our main source of seating at 3 o'clock break. You would think with this big of a garage that we'd have tons a room for all our stuff.... nope you just get more stuff.

Cleaning

Since I'm working 2nd shift I have been getting lots of cleaning done. I think it's because I am here all day by myself and can do what I want, it's daylight and it feels like a vacation day.... until 2:30!! I didn't get much sleep last night since I'm such a creature of habit when I went to work I got my Mt Dew bottle and it took me my 9 hours to drink it like everyday when I go to work.... well when my shift was done the caffeine was kicking in big time so result was..... 2 hours of very restless sleep. I was up with John at 4am and couldn't go back to sleep, so I not only cleaned the living room I also re-arranged it. The furniture has been pushed back against all the walls since we started with the house re-do so it hasn't felt much like a comfortable place to relax. Now even though we are still ripping out walls, drywalling, patching, painting, staining.... I have a place to relax. I know this is SPT and I'm not in the picture but I will tell you that from 12-1 I tried to take a nap in this clean relaxing spot.... no such luck with the nap since I'm not a nap person but I did get a couple HGTV shows watched. Here is my new arrangement, for awhile anyway, I can't wait for paint and pictures on the walls.

Yes that's my Mt Dew in there.... I won't ever learn will I?

First Snow

This morning we woke up to our first snow. I am working 2nd shift this week so of course I had lots of plans to get stuff done outside during the day and now it's cold and snow covered. I watched the weather and maybe by Wednesday I'll get to tackle my outside work. So today I cleaned my bathroom closets and cabinet. How many bottles of half used shampoo and hair spray do I need? And why do I not finish the bottle before starting a new one? When the girls were teenagers they would not empty out the shampoo bottles in the shower, they would start a new one. At one point I stopped cleaning them out just to see what would happen..... as much as it drove me crazy they just lined the tub ledge with bottles. I wonder if their showers are lined with bottles at their own houses? Just kidding girls.... I've been to your houses and I know my cleaning habits were passed down to you now that I'm not there to do it. Now Adam is the same as the girls.... he will not rinse a bottle..... mom will do it!

I don't mind.... when there's no bottles to rinse but my own will be a very sad day. Okay let's go back to the snow.... there wasn't much on the deck but it was very white and in it's own way pretty. You can also see why I have work to do outside, I'm thinking we shouldn't have to light that mosquito torch anytime soon.

Hunting for mice

Today was a very windy cold day but out our patio door was a very determined hawk that was hunting the field for mice. I only got one picture of him since he was so fast after he caught the little bugger. If you look really close you can see the tail wrapped around his foot, unfortunately the picture was very blurry and then when I cropped up on the hawk it gets worse. This was the best I could do and I actually like it.

Grandma's and Boo-Boos

Grandma's are good for helping cure boo-boos. Elly tripped on Grandma's shoes while we were playing on the couch. Grandpa was playing with my camera and I didn't even know it, I'm so glad that he did since I don't have many pictures of Elly and I. When Elly was little I loved pictures of her crying.... I still do. Here are some pictures Grandpa took while I helped the hurt go away. I couldn't decide on one so you get both today.

Missing

I have had a extermly hard week and I had no energy to blog. Friday night I fell asleep on the couch and slept straight through to this morning. 13 hours!! I was lacking a lot more than 13 hours but sleep felt good.

I am back with a picture from Friday, the weather didn't help with my week, but the dark clouds are breaking up and letting the brightness come through.

For those of you concerned....I will be fine. Rough times make us stronger right?

What's a girl to do....

when the weather is getting cold?

BUY NEW SHOES!!

Why is it that buying shoes makes me happy? A way to a guys heart is through his stomach, a way to a girls heart is through her shoes. I love, love love the look of boots and that is the hot style for fall of 2009 so I bought myself a brown pair for those occasions that I my black ones will not match my outfit. After my foot surgery I bought more shoes that hurt my feet than those that don't, unfortunately I can't tell if my feet will hurt until after I wear them for awhile. Having my foot (feet) surgery was the best thing that I could have done but it took me about 2-3 years to not have pain in my feet everyday. For over the last year I can walk, run, exercise and wear fun shoes..... yeah!! Check these out, now I just have to break them in so I can wear them all day, until then they will be fun to wear when John and I go out.

Baby Sprinkle Day

Today was Shannon's sprinkle, she has only 3 weeks left before her baby is due. The time has went by very fast for me. Shan is not uncomfortable yet but is ready for this baby to be here. She has always been a baby lover. If there was a baby in the room Shan was sure to be there holding them until she absolutely had to share with others. We headed for the shack after the sprinkle and with the nice weather we took advantage of taking a nice picture of all of them together.

Cool Foggy Morning

So here in the north it's what the guys call "T-zone" so they can pack their stuff and head to the shack for a weekend of hunting does. It's like pre-hunting season for them and it's the time they will all get a glimpse of the "BIG ONE" and they can't shoot him. So what do I do..... anything I want!! I started the day at 6:45am, why couldn't I sleep in?? Any way the morning was too pretty to miss so I'm glad that I woke up early. The fog was hanging low as the sun came up, the cool air froze the dew drops on the trees until about 10am when the sun finally burned through the fog. As I am walking around shooting about 60 pictures I am wet from all the dew melting off the trees. But I got some fabulous pictures.... more than I can say for my boys at the shack!!

Here is the dew on my favorite bushes with the neighbors barn in the foggy distance.

I couldn't resist showing you this one too. I thought since I got the barn in the foggy distance that maybe our house would look cool also, but no such luck. By the time I searched and searched until I finally got something in the foreground and the house in the background the fog was gone and sun was shining through, but what a fabulous photo. I love the way the berries on the tree match the door and windows. The house looks a little plain since the flowers are all cleaned up for the winter, it makes for a clean fall look.

Then I painted my kitchen ceiling.... why does a person have to re-paint the ceilings? My paint girl recommended that I re-paint all the ceilings in my house including the kitchen where I don't plan on painting. I guess she's the expert so I did that project today. After 5 million trips up and down the ladder the ceiling is done... then my ADHD kicked in and I cleaned above all the cabinets and washed all the Fiesta wear dishes, glass wear and picture frames. Cleaned the stove and cleaned the floors. Then I went to town and bought new rugs, towels and pot holders. Plus baked blueberry muffins and made pretzel dip. Then I put together all the centerpieces for Shan's shower tomorrow and packed up the truck with all the stuff I have to take. My kitchen ceiling does look very, very nice.... I guess she does know what she's talking about!

Warm colors of fall

The many warm colors of fall, I couldn't pick just one photo so you get all of them.

Cute Picture

Wouldn't you just love to have a picture like this, it's a picture that would never get old, it could hang on your wall for years. I did it as a watercolor and it would look georgeous printed on canvas, I hope they enjoy it as much as I do.

Beetles

Is anyone sick of these things already?

Eyes

What are my eyes telling you? Hummmm let's see.... I am determined to finish what I start....that means this Self Portrait Tuesday crap that I started 10 months ago. Isn't this crazy that I'm facing the camera yet you see my back and the camera facing the wrong way???

It was an accident that it came out like this, I was trying to get the catch lights in my eyes and this is what I got. You gotta love the catch lights, next time you see a photo or magazine ad of a person look at the catch lights (white spots) in their eyes. Then when you see a photo of a person with no catch lights it looks very flat and doesn't draw you in.

I'll give you an added childhood memory just to keep this post fun. When we were kids we stayed at home all the time except for school and church. Once a month we would get to go to the grocery store with Mom on a Friday night. We all got allowance and on these special trips to the store we got to spend it on anything we wanted. So we all bought a box of cereal. Frankenberry, Count Chocolula, Fruit Loops, Captain Crunch.... anything with tons of sugar on it. We would all come home from town and put our box of cereal under our beds so no one else could steel it or heaven forbid eat out of it without us knowing. The next morning we all come downstairs with our box and pour the biggest bowl of cereal that we could and put the box right in front of our bowls so we didn't have to look at anyone else and we could read our box. The boys would have 2 bowls, but us girls would save it so that we wouldn't have to eat Puffed Wheat or Puffed Rice.... yeap Puffed Wheat or Rice... kinda like eating Styrofoam. The only thing I wish is that I had a picture of this moment so imagine a round table full of at least 8 kids hiding behind a colorful cereal box. Now think of your kids.... stay at home except for school and church???? Spend allowance on cereal???? Not get sugary cereal if the wanted it???? More than 1 child eating breakfast.... at the table???? Having 11 kids???? Getting them to eat Puffed Cereal???? Going to the grocery store once a month????

More seed heads

These are all cut down now, we cheated this year. Actually not we, it was John, he cut almost everything off with a weedwhip. These hollyhocks were a little too thick so he borrowed the neighbors chain whip, let's just hope they don't mind this rough treatment next spring. While he did most of the chopping I dug out hundreds of plants that were growing where they weren't suppose to be. Everyone who came over this weekend left with bags of plants and I still threw tons away.

Fall Texture

Even though the color is gone from the flowers the seed heads have great texture.

Day trip

John and I took a day trip to a new winery that there is so much talk about. Neither John or I are wine drinkers so we decided to have an open mind and just enjoy the beautiful day and one of the last Jeep rides before it's too cold. We both worked very hard cleaning up flowers that morning and early afternoon so we were both into a relaxing late afternoon. That is exactly what we got and we both had a favorite wine by the time we finished the 12 different taste samples. It was a great time and I'm ready to go back again. It is so worth your time even if wine is not your thing. (Now I may be able to get into my Tuscan Italian Theme complete with wine). Read more about our trip on the Hemmer Happenings.

Kickin' my butt

This plant is kickin' my butt. I can't get this sucker out, it's roots are attached to something in China I think. John and I are working really hard to get the gardens cleaned up before the snowflakes are hitting us. This is the time of year that I wonder why I have so many flowers but it always go away by the time spring rolls around again.

Shannon's Birthday

Today is Shannon's birthday, when she was born we had quite a bit of snow on the ground and this year it's sunny and warm. Shan is my yellow girl, for one of her birthday's when she was about 5 she didn't care what she got for her birthday it just had to be YELLOW. So she got everything yellow, including yellow roses. She was so excited and had to have her picture taken with all of her yellow things. One day my niece Shawna said to me.... "Most people have a clothes line full of bluejeans, towels, whites.... but not you, yours is full of yellow".

Shan was our chatty child always wanting to sit on peoples laps and talk their ears off. She would enter the room with screams and want to be hugged by everyone and then again hugs and kisses when we left. I remember the one day we were driving to Starla and Brad's house and I had to give Shan the "you don't have to sit on Brad's lap the entire time and talk until his ears bleed, you need to go play, you can give hugs and kisses but we need you to stop hanging on everyone" even with the speech she still reacted the same way, Brad's lap was her perch the entire time including the Cheeto Fest. We love you no matter what Shannon, you are the most important piece to this family.... the middle. If it wasn't for the middle you wouldn't have the two ends, you keep those other two in line. You are the white middle of the Oreo Cookie, without the middle it would be just two cookies, with the middle it's an instant favorite.

WE LOVE YOU here's a yellow picture since yellow is still your favorite color.

Happy Birthday Shan

Wall is down

Okay so those of you that have been to our house since this picture

know that we've been looking through 2x4's. Monday the 2x4's came down and it looks very different. Now let me point out what will happen within the next couple of weeks.... I mean months... I mean year!! The walls will be drywalled, the post will be trimmed out with chunky trim boards making them look like old tuscan Italian posts, the other side of the doorway will be a half post with the same chunky trim and the far wall over by the ugly lamp will also be a half post with chunky trim. Those ugly board will come off the vaulted ceiling, the window will be stained, patched and trimmed out. The walls will get painted a fabulous tan and deep red, the accent ceiling walls will be painted a dark mustard yellow that will continue up through the open staircase. I want a black dining room table and new living room furniture and I might even get to put stuff back up on my walls. Can you see it? For those of you that can't vision that type of color scheme just wait you will love it. I did lots of magazine scanning, color selecting, having the paint girl come over to make sure I'm not crazy, it will be warm and inviting and I can't wait until it's done.

Feelings

This may not be a self portrait but it may be how I feel. Nope not the skeleton but the big ole' chubby rat. Last week I started counting WW points again and I felt so good, now this week it's a different story. I have eaten nothing under 500 points in one sitting. Hummm if I remember the program correctly I think I can have 25 points a day, 1500 isn't going to result in any weight loss.

Halloween time has always been the hardest time for me to eat right, I think it's because of all the candy sitting on every one's desk. The treats people bring into share, the warm hot chocolate or soup that feels so good.... The fact that I don't spend my nights outside getting exercise. So tomorrow's a new day and I'll try to get back on the program for at least the rest of the week anyway. It's just not the same starting my day out with a DIET Mt Dew vs. a big ole sugary Mt Dew but I'll do my best.

Fall Frost

It's time for fall frost and it's cold on my morning drive to work....

Old Picture

John's mom (Fran) has a very, very old picture that she has kept in her dresser drawer. She has pulled out the picture many times to show me how much the little girl looks like Shannon. The little girls name is Eleanor and she is held by her mother Kitty (John's Grandmother). This is the only picture there is of the little girl because shortly after it was taken she choked on either a jelly bean or peanut, Fran can't remember anymore what it was and the little girl died. This would have been Fran's older sister. Well during Gilbert and Fran's move last week she pulled the picture out of the drawer once again and asked if I could fix it..... WOW it was pretty bad and I didn't think I could, Fran handed it to me with tears in her eyes and told me I had to throw it away because she couldn't. I put it in my truck so she wouldn't have to see it in her garbage, well I couldn't throw it away either so I started to piece it together as best I could and took a picture of it. I think I can continue to work on it and get it to be just like new to print her another one and maybe even a copy for Shannon. Isn't it funny how Shannon named her little girl Ellyn and she looks pretty similar to Eleanor. Freaky huh?

Excellent Wedding Cake

My favorite part for the wedding we decorated for this weekend was the cake. It was made by my Aunt Susie and it was the funnest cake ever. It looked just like one of the cakes out of a Brides Magazine that no one ever wants to try. This bride was so fun, her organization, attention to details, decorations and colors showed her true personality. Our decorations gave this cake it's sassy appeal and we didn't even know what it looked like, it sat on top of an old green dresser with 3 mirrors reflecting the light from all sides. Great job Aunt Susie and Congratulations to the newlyweds.

And because it's so worth a closer look, I'll give you a bonus picture of just the cake.

Kessler

We seen this cool poster up north a couple weeks ago but they had used Jack Daniels. The neighbors dog is named Kessler so we staged the same poster at the bar down the road tonight. It's not quite like the poster we seen but it's pretty darn close and should look great framed in the neighbors basement bar.

Pink Wedding

How about a little pink? This weeks wedding we decorated for is lots of pink and it's sooooo cute. Jeannie painted a shoe for the bathroom stuff and it holds the hairspray just perfectly.

Her guest book is sooo cute, she used the engagement pictures I took and made them into a guest book. They look so good and the book is so fun to look at. So here's a bonus picture for you of the guest book with one of my picture in it.

Fall scenery

The fall scenery on my drives to and from work are simply amazing. This was taken on my way home for lunch. I love the round bales in the foreground. I'm thinking we have a few days before peak color yet so I will have to continue to have my camera with me wherever I go.