Monday, October 24, 2011

Croptober #11

I must apologize for the missing posts last week.  I have had some things going on here the last couple months that, at times, are all consuming and are causing major interruptions in my life and time.  I am hoping things will stabilize for my family and I soon; the sooner the better.  Please hang in there as I try to find a new normal.

The weekend was gorgeous, again.  As I was hauling our butts from the north side of town for one game, down to the south side for another, I was reminded again how much I love this time of year.  I love the wind (and we've had plenty) tossing the leaves out the trees.  I love the blue color the sky is this time of year.  I love that early morning crispness - Hey, when you have a field arrival time of 8:15 am, you can't help but notice the crispness.  Makes that mug of coffee all the better.  I love driving through the neighborhood and watching the leaves dance along behind the car.  I love topping hills and seeing all the color in the city stretched out below.  I love that both boys' teams pulled out wins - WOOHOO, makes that getting up at 6:30 on a Saturday worth while.

We also are prepping for our first snowfall, expected later in the week.  We'll see if it really arrives, but it had the kids out raking (and the toddler un-raking and jumping into) the leaves in the yard.  I was pulling ripened tomatoes from the bushes - I'm running out of ideas of what to do with these things!  I've got a salsa recipe to try to make later this week.  I pulled the remaining jalapenos off the bushes - some for roasting and some for that salsa.  I cut the rosemary and have it drying in the pantry.  I cut the tarragon and dried it in the oven - smelled like a licorice factory in the kitchen.  I'll pull the basil and oven dry it later today.  If the temps fall like expected, I'll have to glean the rest of the unripened tomatoes and brown-bag-ripen them - there are still too many out there to let them fall to the frost.  I even made a batch of cupcakes that were supposed to resemble candy corn (which I hate as a candy) but the colors mixed too much.  But shoot, it's a cupcake, how much time can you admire it before you just have to eat it?

So fairly productive for me. . .were you?  If not, let's give you something more fun than figuring out what to do with 20 pounds of tomatoes.  Since Croptober is banishing our fear of the embellishment. . .let's create an embellishment.  Making your own embellishments are a great way for using scraps and pieces.  Today create a tag and embellish with leftover buttons, ribbon, paper scraps or those odds and ends and then, of course, use it!  Depending on the size you choose to make, it could be the only embellishment you need.  If you make smaller ones, group it with other elements:  ribbon, photo grouping, journaling block, title space.  Layouts this week are due Saturday evening.

Here Sous Chef Anet Tietjen created great tags using the Fancy Pants Oct. 31st papers from the Bigger than a Breadbox October kit.  These kinds of things are great for your layouts or cards, but given the time of year, would be cute on treat bags too.


Alrighty then, I'm off to deal with household stuff and Apron Strings stuff.

Happy Monday.




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