What's Up Wednesday ~ September 2018

What we're eating this week..............

Monday - snacking our way through dinner

Tuesday - breakfast food

Wednesday - church

Thursday - sheet pan chicken, veggies, sweet potato fries, salad

Friday - pizza

Saturday - date night

What I'm reminiscing about............

This time last year, we were on our vacation in California.  The last few days we have been saying..."This time last year...."

What I'm loving..............

It has been great this week for temperatures under 90!  I am hoping we don't see anymore of those this year.

What we've been up to................

We had our first college visit  for our daughter last weekend.  You can read about it on yesterday's blog. We are always up to work, but we've also been working on remodeling our guest bath, doing homework and keeping up with the house things.

What I'm dreading................

Nothing in the near future :)

What I'm working on.....................

Cleaning my house...this is ongoing, but yet I feel quite behind in this area.  

What I'm watching/reading..................

A few new shows premiered that I plan on watching at some point....The Voice, Dancing with the Stars and my weekly Hallmark movie and The Pioneer Woman.

What I'm listening to.................

This is on repeat each month....my podcast of Greg Laurie from Harvest.

What I'm wearing.......................

Jeans and tunics...until it is a little cooler and I can wear leggings with boots :)

What I'm doing this weekend..................

I am helping my mom host a bridal shower to celebrate my sweet niece.  Avery and I have a fun date planned too.

What I'm looking forward to next month............

October brings cooler weather, a fall break trip, and celebrating Brook's birthday!

What else is new.....................

We are car shopping, which is part of preparing a daughter for college.

College Visit

Hi!  We took a weekend road trip, so I was off from blogging Monday.  But today, here are pictures from our weekend trip, which consisted of our first college visit!  My oldest will graduate in May, so we are at that time of life.  How can this be?  

This picture seems like yesterday.  She looks college ready :).

Here we go for our tour.... 

It was such a pretty campus and we were all impressed.

I am excited for her.  I am not excited for the college goodbyes, but it is what we've been training for 18 years. 

While we were in town, we saw another friend who goes to college nearby. 

We also ate at one of my favorite restaurants. We stayed with some friends and and also got to see some other friends on our drive home, so it is fun to have people in different places we visit.

Join us tomorrow for our What's Up Wednesday!

Girl Chat ~ Fall Bucket List

I have missed some the summer Girl Chats, but am joining back up for today's fall bucket list topic.

My girls are both teenagers and I work full time now, so my fall bucket list has changed during the years.  

I can sum up my current bucket list to basically, enjoy the cooler temperatures!  How do I plan to do that?  Well, here a few ways.....

1.  Work in the yard....It gets so hot in the summer and my good intentions to work in the yard just don't happen from June-September too much.  I want to pull up weeds, mow the grass one last time for the season, and plant some mums.

2.  Buy pumpkins for the front porch.....We really don't use our front door too much since we have our garage, but I do want to clean it, buy some pumpkins, and make it look more inviting.  I usually wait until October to purchase pumpkins.

3.  Wear fall clothes.....It is no secret how much I love my leggings, shirts and boots in the fall and winter.

4.  Watch fall Hallmark movies!....I am looking forward to watching these on the weekends.

5. Bake pumpkin breads.........I need to stock up on some more pumpkin and hope to start baking next week. 

6.  Evening walks to the lake.........We enjoy seeing the fall colors and not sweating so much just to walk to the lake in the evenings when the temperatures are cooler.

7.  Fall break trip..........We have a long weekend road trip planned for fall break and look forward to getting away again.

8.  Halloween costumes.........We still manage to come up with some type of costume  for Halloween and haven't outgrown this yet.  I just don't have cute little princesses anymore.  Where did the time go??

9.  Hot drinks.........I look forward to drinking hot tea and hot chocolate in the fall.

10.  Candy corn...........Last but not least, indulge in some candy corn.  And, I have actually already had my one bag for the season, so I can cross this one off my list :).

How We Fall ~ Fall Decor

Happy Wednesday!  First, let me say happy birthday to two people I love very much...

1.  My husband!  I am so thankful for his life and to be his wife.

2.  My niece!  I will never forget the excitement of when I became an aunt.  I have loved watching Nicole grow from a baby to an adult who loves Jesus and her family so much.  I love those kids of hers too!

Today I am linking up and sharing our fall decorations.  Even though it wasn't cool outside, I brought out my fall decorations last weekend and made a trip to Hobby Lobby :).  I still have a few things to add, but I am so looking forward to the official start of fall this Saturday!

Welcome to our home!

I have a fall welcome mat to add and usually wait until October to buy real pumpkins. 

 

This is our entry way with a "Joyful, Thankful, Blessed" sign.

Our dining room table.  I bought this table runner last year and still really like it.

I have a pumpkin tray behind our kitchen sink, with some pumpkins and gourds in a glass pumpkin dish.

On my tiered tray on our kitchen counter where we keep fruits, vegetables and vitamins, I added my small pumpkin dishes and some fall fabric.

Here is a view of our breakfast table into the kitchen.

I added fall place mats, napkins, acorn salt and pepper shakers and a ceramic pumpkin to our breakfast table. 

This hangs on our door leading to the garage. 

A view of our fireplace.  

This is the first fall to have my mantle Avery built for me. I added lights and pumpkins for a simple decoration.

This white, metal pumpkin is a new touch to my decorations this year. 

On this table, in addition to cute, but outdated pictures of my greats, I have this pumpkin candle stand. 

 

I added our autumn throw pillow to our sofa.

This is a view of our outdoor table on our porch.  We hope to eat out here more when these temperatures decide to cool down....hopefully before the end of the month! 

I keep fall napkins, a ceramic pumpkin, and games on the table. 

A few other non-pictured items I like to display for the season are fall soaps in the bathrooms, pumpkins on the front porch (yet to be purchased), and a I have a few Halloween and Thanksgiving items I will put out closer to those holidays.

Thanks for stopping by and looking forward to seeing all the fall decor today!

Weekend Wrap Up ~ We Won a Pie!

Happy Monday :)

My oldest began homeschool classes for her senior year 2 weeks ago.  Where did the time go???  When you work full time, have a senior who drives to her own classes, sometimes you get a stain on the sign and take the picture a little late, but that's okay!

After several other planned events we had for Friday night changed, we had a fun, much needed family dinner at a Mexican restaurant we had not tried before.  The food was good and I ordered a bow lof soup, which was huge!

I had a chance to watch the Hallmark Fall preview special, along with a Hallmark movie this weekend.

After church Sunday, we were sitting at the table finishing lunch when we heard a noise outside.  I went outside and found this surprise...........

A fresh, homemade huckleberry pie from Montana! 

When we were in Montana this summer, I signed up to win a pie and I won!   

This was the first time I have been eating a meal, and literally, a fresh pie was delivered at our door as soon as we finished lunch. 

We served it with some ice cream, and it was delicious!!

We went back to church Sunday night and heard Isabella and another team member from her mission trip to NYC this summer speak to the kids of the church.  They did a great job. 

So thankful for the opportunity she had to go on this trip and to share it with others.

How We Fall

Today I am talking about How We Fall and also Fall Fashion.

Here are some ways we embrace fall around here.  I have some fall foods and crafts listed on my fall Pinterest board.

Hot Drinks

I do enjoy hot drinks in the fall and winter.  I am not a coffee drinker, but enjoy hot tea or hot chocolate.  If I am out and about, I enjoy a Starbucks hot chocolate.

If we make hot chocolate at home for the family, it is usually Colombian hot chocolate.  We have had several people bring us some so we have some in stock. 

The Colombian hot chocolate comes from these chocolate bars you see below and cooked on the stove in an aluminum pitcher, called a chocolatera and mixed with this special wooden mixer, called a molinillo.

Candy Corn

I love candy corn, but I also like it in this autumn mix with the pumpkins.  I try to indulge in this snack only once during the season, but it brings joy when that happens!

Pumpkin breads

I just began embracing pumpkin flavored food about 4 years ago.....silly me!  Now, I love having cans of pumpkin in stock at our home in the fall.

The only downfall for me is that most pumpkin recipes I like are not the healthiest, but they sure are delicious.  Here are two of my favorite sweet pumpkin recipes.  I do have one low-calorie pumpkin recipe on my pinterest board however!

Pumpkin chocolate chip bread

Pumpkin chocolate chip cookies

Boots, leggings, tunics, and scarves

This is my fashion look for the fall.  

These leggings are my favorite.  Like most things from Nordstrom, I bought these during the anniversary sale.  I have several tunics from Old Navy that I like and of course my favorite boots are the ones I talk about every year...these Uggs.

Evening walks

I am hoping as the weather gets cooler, I will have the energy in the evenings for a walk to our neighborhood lake.

Football games

We have been to one high school football game and will attend at least one more.  I am not a huge football fan, but I do like football season.

Birthdays

My husband has a September birthday, my youngest daughter has an October birthday, and I have a November birthday, so we celebrate birthdays in the fall.  (My oldest has a winter birthday, so we all have cool season birthdays :)).

Decorating

I plan on decorating for fall this weekend, even though it isn't going to feel too cool.  That's okay.  I know it is coming.  I will be sharing these decorations next week on the blog.

Woo hoo, glad we are at the mid week point.  Enjoy your day!