Blogging is Tough

I know it's been 2 weeks since my last blog post. It isn't because I haven't thought about it. I just haven't had a chance to get pictures sorted out, thoughts onto Internet, etc. Ever have a crazy time in your life? Yeah, so that's most of the time. This time, it feels like I'm in slow motion in a fast moving scene. So, for a few updates on what has been done toward "October Daily"...

Westwood Fall Festival - check. Complete with silent auctions wins (Xmas shopping!), Haunted House, Cotton Candy (3x for me), and Pumpkin Walk. The pumpkin walk reminded me of fun times I did Cake Walks as a kid. Yum-O!

Pumpkin Picking - check. Complete with Smoking Ghoulish displays, Petting Zoo, Pony Ride, Hay Bales, Rain, and one Blue Pumpkin for the 4 Orange we got at the festival.

Halloween Costumes - in progress. 1 bald cap for monk costume, 1 gladiator shell, wings and sword for Angel Gabriel costume (not sure why the religious theme sprung up for the kids), and stuff for my costume. Hubby elects not to dress up this year (so far). My first real need for the costumes is this coming Thursday for the Hambly Papers Event. I'm supposed to be an Ice Cream Cone. My material sits patiently waiting for assembly. That was my plan last night, but...

Power-Outage-Pulls-Family-Around-Table-by-Candlelight-Night - check. It's rare we have power outages in this city because we have our own power plant. However, when one blows or crushes a box, then your home gets no access to that lovely flowing electricity. It's really fun to see lights across the way, and you're out back barbequing with a camping lantern. I could have totally jumped at hubby's offer to go out to dinner, but instead, I took the challenge to make dinner (sausages, chicken and wild rice/basmati) with zero kitchen functionality. We had candles lit all over the place. I wrote down on the whiteboard how many, so I'd be sure to extinguish all of them before bedtime. ETA on power outage was 4-6 hours. One son swept out back, one went to the park, everyone went to bed on time without complaint, we had dinner by candlelight, everyone sat at the table after dinner, and I had help finishing up some crafting projects (yes, also by candlelight).

So...pictures tonight hopefully. :) Have a great day!

Pumpkin Ravioli

How is it that every day can be so busy? Is it because there's so much relaxing in places like Kauai and the Virgin Islands that there is a need to be so busy in Las Vegas and the Silicon Valley for the world as a whole to be balanced? Well. I. don't. know.

So, to sprinkle a little holiday into my week, I made a simply delicious dinner. Even my hubby (who came home from a dinner meeting) had to eat.

Pumpkin Ravioli. Yum-O! After cooking the pasta a few minutes, I melted a touch of butter on it with a teaspoon of honey. That's it. Delish (as Rachael Ray would say).



Fresh from Whole Foods



What do you do with your raviolis?

October Takeover

Disney has kicked off it's 2010 "October Takeover". I'm not sure why, but I enjoy the annual showing of the 1998 film, "Halloween Town". It's kind of like the traditional Christmas and Winter Holiday shows like Frosty, The Grinch Who Stole Xmas, and Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.

What I'm not looking forward to is the Season Finale and end of "Wizards of Waverly Place". I could do without the Jonas Brothers, but the family of wizards, tough cookie mom and fashion risk-taker best friend are such crack-ups.

I whipped up a quick card inspired by this magical season already in full flight. The challenge was to use what was pretty much in arm's reach in my ready but unpacked Halloween stash.

Hoping your week is Frighteningly Fun!

Sunday at Our House

Water polo, water polo, and more water polo. These are the Sundays to come for our household starting today. We had an ALL day tournament in Moraga. It was a gorgeous day and both boys' teams played well. It felt really good, actually, to get back into the swing of the season. I took some pictures today, but not yet sure how they came out. I didn't put too much effort into it as a I was trying to watch the matches.

Hmmmm...could be time for a layout.

Robot Birthday Card

I hope you all had a great creative day. I think my favorite creation today was a very simple robot birthday card complete with moving parts (the little thing on the wire slides and gears turn).

Voila!

World Card Making Day

Happy World Card Making Day! It's officially the day to pull out of our stash (you all have more than enough) and make cards for any occasion. You may want to get a head start for the winter holidays or put together something for Halloween or build up your birthday, sympathy, thinking of you inventory, or put together cards for the Troops. I'd like to do all of the above, but realistically, I'll get what I get.

If you are interested in sending cards to troops abroad so they can use them for their own families and friends check out the "needs" and info at Operation Write Home.

For inspiration check out Mish Mash, Kristina Werner, Sunflower Studio, Kristi Lockart, or of course the World Card Making Day website.

There really isn't a wrong way to make a card. Handmade is beautiful! Make just one at least and feel free to post or link your creation here.

Oh, by the way, we ended up watching "Ghostbusters 2" last night through Netflix's on-demand disc for the wii. Good times...

Cheers!

October Daily

Happy First of October! My "October" resolution is to develop habits. I'm going to start a couple of projects that REQUIRE that I blog daily. This keeps up my blog, my activities and hopefully my sanity.

So, to kick-off, I'm taking a page out of Ali Edward's book and doing an October Daily Album. Ali actually does a December Daily and is currently in the process of selecting an album. I am going to just jump in with 2 feet and do an October Daily. Why Not? Halloween is one of my fave holidays, autumn is a new season, it's really the start of the holiday season...and I just need to do something.

So, I'm going to sit down and figure out the memories I want to capture this month, I'm going to pull out my papers and embellies (luckily Halloween/Fall stuff is actually organized), and get going.

Since I have nothing lined up yet and it's officially Oct 1, I'm going to capture my first album memory here.

Friday, Oct 1 - The kids and I were planning on seeing the movie, "Vampires Suck". What an approprox flick to see to jump start the Halloween season. The best laid plans.... I had looked up this move the other day, sent out the Outlook requests to all attendees (Yup, me and the kids), and off we went at 6:30 for the 7:15.  What we found out at the door is that the movie schedule changed this morning, the first of the month. WHO takes a vampire movie out of rotation in October?!

So.....plan B. We're settling down to see a B-movie-style, indie flick called "Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter". I'll let you know how it goes.