Fall Projects

One of the nice things about this very rainy start to our Fall season, is that handy excuse rain gives us to stay inside and work on those inside-type of projects we all like to do.

For instance, it's very extremely hard to convince myself that cleaning out our closets is a great project on a day with bright sunshine and pleasant breezes.  But on a day that is dark, and drippy, it is a lot easier to tackle a messy closet.

Hold it right there.  I'm not saying I did clean out any of my closets.  I'm just saying it is easier to envision myself embarking on that type of project on a rainy day.

No no -  but here are some projects that we did work on this weekend :)

1.  I basted the quilt - which involved cleaning up the screened porch first (see I did do some cleaning) and then laying the three layers of the quilt sandwich across the floor.  Thank you to Aunt Dagmar for clueing me in to a product called 505, which is a temporary spray-on adhesive.  It made the basting so so easy!  I have no idea how people quilt three layers together using only safety pins to secure them to each other.
And then I rolled it up and began quilting it on my machine.  This will be the first quilt that I have ever finished from beginning to end entirely on my machine.  Which is neat.  I'm finding out fast that quilting takes a lot of thread.  A lot of thread.  A whole lot of thread.

2.  The boys finished making their little books about Fall.  They colored pictures (like these), and did some worksheets I printed (like these), and they wrote a list of their "Fall favorites" and a "Fall Story" and then we finished it off with collecting some leaves and making a few wax paper leaf pages.  We recycled a cardboard box for the covers and used a three-hole-punch and yarn as our binding.
They are very pleased with their books and will excitedly read them to anyone that passes by, including the cats and the chickens.  Jojo took his to school for share and tell.

3.  Mike has moved introduced home-made bagels to our Sunday morning breakfast this week.   All of us were excited about that new turn of events.  Bagels!  I have  to say, he conducts this bread making of his with a scientific mind-frame and furrowed brow.  He researches and reads, and jots down notes.  He measures, and checks, and checks again.  Very often I come into the kitchen, and there are four little loaves, laying peacefully under a flour-dusted blanket on the counter... it seems like they're napping, so I walk quietly and speak softly around them.  He gets temperatures just right in the oven, tossing cupfuls of water into the bottom for steam.  That man is getting a method down pat.  And I don't mind a bit.  But my jeans are getting tight.  So there's that problem.

4.   Since we happen to be avid little leaf collectors in the Fall, we ended up with a rather large pile of pretty leaves on the table after our last walk.  So we took a bunch of old jars off of the shelf, and made these this weekend.  That was fun.  I have never used my mod podge.  I bought it one time, without a particular project in mind.   It's been waiting in my art supplies since then.  Until this moment.  I like mod podge.  Mod podge.  Yes.  I like it.  Yes I do.
But it stinks.


And some other Fall ideas I love:

5.  Warm spiced apple cider.  Yep.  I'll be taking that to work this week.

6.  This idea

7.  This isn't Fall related, but I LOVE it!   And it's got me thinking a whole lot about embroidering on linen.  Which never occurred to me before.

8.  And these.  I need these.  And they're simple, and simple is always good.

And for that matter, these too.  In fact, the Purlbee has been posting good idea after good idea lately.

9.  And lastly, I hesitate to send you over here, because she's so damn funny you'll probably never bother coming back here... but I can't help myself.  I have to share the funny.  This website makes me laugh every day, sometimes until I get to that painfully awkward cry-laughing stage in which other people look at me quizzically, wondering if I'm mentally ill.  (I'm not.)    (yet.)


What are you making this week?  What's got you laughing till you cry?