Halloween Delights

Yesterday was our party for the little kids and we had a blast. We made crafts, decorated cupcakes, ate junk, got some treats and we dressed up!

Here are a few snapshots:

Spooktacular times!

Terrific Tot...Wednesday!

I am falling behind on my posts! But to make up for it, here are two ideas for celebrating the Spooky season!

On Sunday I showed these bags that I had started to make. They didn't have some of the finishing touches I wanted to add. All I used were simple craft materials: foam circles for the outline of the eyes, googly eyes, felt for the noses, hair and teeth, decorative cord for the mouths and a good, ole Sharpie marker for the "stitches" on Frankenstein's face.

Then, as part of our decorations for our up-coming Halloween get-together, my little artists helped to create our Halloween themed banner:

If you have a great craft idea for Halloween I'd love for you to share in the comments below!

Thanks for reading.

Halloween Countdown

Most of the posts this week will be about Halloween and some fun ideas that can be used for little ones. I mentioned on my last post that we have some friends coming over for some fun, spooktacular activities. I'm starting to get organized my creating some fun give aways and decorate some of our pumpkins. Here is a sneak peek:

Can you believe that this bag was at Michael's for less than fifty cents!

As you can see, I can't take all the credit, as my little artists helped in making these pumpkins with their own little hands to create a spider...of course mommy helped glue on the eyes and mouth!

How about these pumpkins! We were given these "Mr. Potato-esque" pieces for some of our pumpkins as a give away for a birthday party. What a great idea (and no mess!).

Created by my other little artist!

So there you have it, just a taste of some of the things we are working on to celebrate Halloween. Stay tuned for more!!!!

Thanks for reading.

Kids Parties: Halloween

This year we are hosting our second annual kids party. The little guys come over in their Halloween costumes, make a craft or two, and then enjoy yummy food and drinks. I have seen a lot of websites and blogs refer to pinterest, an online bulletin board where you can "pin" up your online finds and ideas for things you love. To get ready for this get together I went on this site to find some Halloween ideas, which you can find here.

Just a quick post but one with some great ideas for the holiday!
Thanks for reading!

Wednesday's Dream...Come True

Flash back to about six years ago...before I started dating my husband I loved to run, and train for road races. Just before the time I had met my husband, I had completed both half and full marathons. 

As we began to date, I shifted into training for triathlons. While I loved this sport, the time it took to properly train for all three disciplines can be daunting, and that's when I had a lot more time on my hands!

Flash forward to when my first son was born. While pregnant I had this ideal image of me quickly bouncing back into shape, into my old routine, training for a half marathon again, and having a new born along as a sidekick; then came reality and a huge life lesson, and some post-partum depression I'm certain of now in retrospect. That idea of trying to get back into shape quickly faded, and with that, my dream of running a half marathon fizzled. 

Another contributing factor for my lack of motivation, was we were trying to get pregnant again, so our kids would be close in age. So my attitude became "What's the point?".

Flash forward to August of this year. I had a couple of close friends and my sister ask if I was interested in racing again in the fall. I figured this was a sign, if this many people were asking me. My sister and I had never run together so this would be a great opportunity for her and I to have some sisterly fun (I know, this not everyone's idea fun! But think of it this way - you can eat WHATEVER you want after your long runs!)

Then, flash forward to this past Sunday. My sister and I completed a half marathon together, and I have to say this one will go down in the books for me. I didn't run this race for a personal best time; rather, I ran it for a personal best accomplishment...this was my first half using my married name, my first half as a mom, my first half my three boys would see me finished. And I have to say it was sooooo well worth it. Even the training in the rain, or when I had to run on a treadmill for 2 hours while my kids napped... it was all worth it on Sunday!

So there's my dream come true - running a half marathon post kids!

Thanks for reading!

Thursday's Dream: Crown Moulding

Since returning to work my dream has been to put some finishing touches throughout the house. This process may take a little while to complete, but I'm so happy that we can finally make this happen. I am already finding that these touches are making our house our home; I'm creating rooms that make me happy the moment I see them.

This past week we hired a family friend to help us install crown moulding in our living room and dining rooms. When we discussed installing crown we were wondering if it was a DIY project we could take on ourselves. But no matter how many online videos we watched, or asked those who had taken on the task themselves, we could visualize how to make the cuts, or to properly install into the ceilings. I have to say, watching how someone places the moulding helps me understand so much better. We had also looked into professional companies specializing in crown moulding, but the price tag was to hefty for our wallets. Having said that, the cost of the moulding was still more than we budgeted for two rooms (we figured since we chose primed MDF instead of wood, the cost would be less...we just figured it would be a lot less!).

Here is what the ceilings look like now:

I apologize for the low quality of pics. I love the outcome of the rooms. Our next step is to paint the mouldings. Just have to figure out a tint of paint to use, and the finish.

On another note, yesterday I posted about baking apple pie; I had a pic all lined up to go with my post but I experienced some technical difficulties. Here is my pic for yesterday's post:

Mmmmm....

Thanks for reading.

Wednesday's Delight: Apple Pie

During this time of year pies are so comforting. I know a lot of people who hate making them, or don't know how to make pastry. It isn't hard - if I can do it, anyone can! Here's our family recipe for the pastry - Tenderflake! The recipe is right on the box of lard, and the dough turns out everytime.

The apple pie recipe I use is from The Complete Canadian Living Cookbook, and the recipe is simply called "Best-Ever Apple Pie" (on page 328). 

For the filling you need:

8 cups of thinly sliced apples

2 tbsp lemon juice

1/2 cup of sugar

3 tbsp all-purpose flour

1/2 tsp cinnamon

In a large bowl, toss apples with lemon juice. Stir together sugar, flour and cinnamon, and then sprinkle over your apples and toss until coated. Then pour into your prepared pie shell. Roll out a second piece of pastry and top it over top of your apple filling; be sure to leave a bit of pastry on the edges (an overhang). Seal you bottom pastry with your top layer, ventilate the top piece with cuts in the centre, or you can get creative and cut out shapes of leaves for fall! Bake in bottom third of oven at 425 degrees F for 15 minutes. Then reduce heat to 350 degrees F and bake for 40 minutes longer, or until golden, and the filling is bubbly and apples are soft. Then cool on a rack.

Happy Baking!

Terrific Tot Tuesday: Happy Birthday

Back in May I did a few posts about K-man's birthday party. A few weeks back my youngest little guy celebrated his big day. I did a Mini Cooper themed birthday (can you guess his name?!). The colours I used were black, red, blue and white. I found online some colouring sheets to print off for the kids to colour. Using construction paper I cut out some Mini Cooper car shapes, wheels and windows for the kids to make their own cars. I made the cake again, using the logo and car look-a-likes from the franchise for the decorations, all by freehand as there are no cutters for such shapes! And remember back in February when I made those valentines with the chocolate bags attached? I used the same idea for the give aways, by using Picnik. The birthday boy was also in a onesie that had the mini cooper logo on it, made by printing it onto a transversable sheet that you iron onto the shirt of your choice.

Here are a few pics:

Once again we had a wonderful day surrounded by friends and family.
Thanks for reading!

Thank goodness!

This Thanksgiving I am grateful for so many things. 

I'm grateful for my family. I have an amazing husband who supports me in all I do and pursue, who makes me laugh, and who's there for me in tough times. I am grateful for my two wonderful children, who are so different in character, make me want to be a better person, and teach me knew things everyday. They truly make me smile everyday.

I know people often aren't grateful for health until something negative happens, but I'm very grateful for health. I'm glad all those around me are healthy, in sound mind, and, touch wood, will continue to be.

I am grateful for my job, and my home, for being creative, for all things that make me laugh, and push me to improve myself. 

And I'm thankful for all those who continue to read my blog.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Friday's Delight

We've been busy here!

Stay tuned!

Terrific Tots Tuesday: Thanksgiving and Fall Crafts

This past weekend I revisited the blog "Handprint and Footprint Art" I raved about previously, and got some ideas for this coming weekend for the grandparents. You can visit the website here. And here are the products created by my little artists:

As you can see from the brushes, I painted my kidlets' hands and then pressed their hands on the paper to get a better relief print. I had also bought paint especially for hand painting but found the colour dull. So I've used my acrylic paints instead.



The leaves were created by mixing brown, orange and red right on my kids hands and then pressed on the paper. Once dried I drew on the leaves' veins.

 Google a fall or Thanksgiving poem to accompany the prints and there you go! Pretty cute don't you think?

Thanks for reading.

Sunday's Supper

I thoroughly making dinner when I don't feel rushed; enter weekend cooking. I would never boast as a good cook - that gene went to other members of my family, I believe, and I got the baking gene! Having said that, tonite we enjoyed a family favourite from CBC's t.v. show Best Recipe's Ever: their Best 1/4 Chicken Dinner. I highly recommend it. We've used it at the cottage on the barbecue when entertaining guests, or cooked it just for the immediate family as a warm meal on a cold, rainy fall night, like tonite. The recipe is super easy, and not as time consuming as one would think. It just needs some time for marinating the chicken and potatoes. So try it out, you can find the recipe here.

Let me know your favourite Sunday night dinner by leaving a comment below.

Have a great night and thanks for reading.

Saturday Doodle: Arm Warmers

As the weather cools (today especially!) it's time to pull out the fall and winter attire. To embrace the season I saw an online tutorial on how to make your own arm warmers using women's knee high socks. You can find the tutorial here. In the meanwhile, here is my attempt at making some arm warmers for my little men:

BTW: did you notice the new icon on the top right hand side? Become a member of my blog (it just means you're enjoying what I write, use some of the ideas, whatever...join!)

Thanks for reading!