A Black Eye

Those 2 year olds at Leah's daycare are a rough and tumble bunch.  I don't know if it has to do with the fact there are 3 girls and about 10 boys.  Leah's always coming home with "ouch reports" along with bite marks and other boo-boos.  Her latest turned into a black eye.  The photo's don't show it clearly, but it's her right eye.

this was this morning

this was this afternoon

And I also caught her writing.  It was super cute, so I had to include it here.

Menagerie

Just a few bits and pieces so you at least have something to read :)

We and Lizzy had been going to dog training; it was a 7 week course.  She "graduated" a few weeks ago.  She may not be as awesome as the dog the instructor brought to class, but she knows a few commands.  When you strap on a leash, she knows its time for business.

I've been knitting some socks, which i don't have a picture of yet, but I also started a button up cowl.  I had quite a few opportunities to knit the day I started it.  This was all done in one day.  My friend says the yarn is so ugly it's pretty.  Ha!

Some Knitting

I got some wonderfully soft baby alpaca/cashmere yarn that has been waiting for the perfect project.  Since it is so soft, a scarf it was to become.  I found a lovely pattern on ravelry and cast on.  The knitting didn't take too long and I washed it up and blocked it this weekend.

Falling leaf pattern

And here is my lovely model showing it off.  And I can't wait to wear it!

Pumpkin Decorating

My work has a pumpkin decorating contest.  Me and all the girls entered a pumpkin.  Anna got a second place and Grace got third place in their age group category.

 Grace's spiderweb pumpkin.  It started to cave in on one side and the web got a bit loose.

 My mummy pumpkin.  I thought it was uber cute, however the judges didn't think so :(

Anna's caterpillar pumpkins; she called it Little Spot.  Mommy fail, I didn't get a picture of Leah's, but we gave her a Sharpie and let her have at it.

My one observation is, why does hot glue not work so well on pumpkins?

Halloween

Last night is the scariest night of the year.  This year it was only made a little more spooky by Jeremy watching several Halloween movies in the last week.  The girls each had a party at school.  Then we went to the mall and went around to each store and picked up some candy.  Then we hit about 7 houses before the big ones were too cold and ready to go home.  By then the loot was piling up anyways.  Without further ado, the costumes!

Grace as Cleopatra 

Cleo with Ms. Ladybug

Anna as Dorothy, complete with Toto

A monkey, banana included (check out the pocket on her right)

The ladybug was Leah's school costume; the monkey was for trick or treating.  And I'll wager you can figure out who the warmest one was last night.

My work puts on a pumpkin decorating contest each year.  This year our family won some prizes...more to come on that later!

Carrots

Remember when I showed you the clump of carrots that the girls helped plant in this post.  We decided to dig up a clump and check it out.  We have several more clumps we're going to leave in the ground until the first frost.

Check out the twisted mess, er mass, of carrots.  It was like taking apart a jigsaw puzzle when we separated them.  And totally unrelated, but requested, a pic of Leah in her birthday shirt from great-Grandma.

Applesauce

One of the offerings in one of the recent Bountiful Baskets was a box of Gala apples.  I decided to make it all into applesauce.  My pot wasn't big enough so I made several batches.  It took me a bit (and a little help from Jeremy) to figure out my apple peeler, corer, slicer.  The first batches had some peel, or a lot of peel, so I used my ricer do-hicky to get the peel out.  Of course this made it rather smooth.  The last few batches I ensured there was very little peel and made chunky applesauce.  Then I mixed them together and put it in quart jars.  Being lazy, I decided to freeze instead of can it.

chunky in the pot

all the applesauce mixed together

jarred up

It made 6 quarts and a pint.  Darn tasty, if I do say so myself.